


The Indomitable Duo

by Skyrimosity



Category: Naruto, 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia
Genre: Friendship, Fusion, Gen, Soft M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-28
Updated: 2020-03-15
Packaged: 2020-09-28 16:03:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 30,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20428661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skyrimosity/pseuds/Skyrimosity
Summary: Following his victory at the Sports Festival, Bakugo receives an offer to undergo field training with one of the more mysterious pro heroes: Hokage. Unbeknownst to him, however, this one small decision would have ripples that would alter the course of events to follow. Mostly because he'd have to deal with Hokage's sidekick, 'that idiot blond'. As more threats rise against the hero-dominant society, working together with those he despises becomes less and less avoidable.





	1. The Mysterious Hokage

By the time Bakugo walked into class 1-A that morning, he had managed to talk himself into a partial acceptance of his victory at the Sports Festival. It was a mistake that people had held back against him, but in the end, he won the fights and they didn't. He told them he was going to win, and he won.

But it was undeniable that more people were talking about Icyhot and that damned Deku than him, and that's what annoyed him the most. As if they thought either of those two had a chance at being the Number One hero or something. The Sports Festival was a battle, and in a way he won it, but he had his mind on the war.

"Hey, congrats on the win Bakugo!" Spiky Hair said to him, making him divert his glare.

"Didn't win a damned thing, you damn idiot." Just because he personally accepted a small victory didn't mean he'd confess it. He sat at his desk, grabbing the textbooks they would probably be needing out of his backpack and then just sat there silently. Why couldn't some people just accept their mediocrity and leave him out of their lives instead of trying to drag him down with them? Any moron who wasn't severely brain-damaged would realize that it was not a real victory if his opponent had not been going full-strength, but the supporting characters were not exactly the smartest people. And Spiky Hair was one of the least annoying classmates, he reminded himself with a groan.

"No need to be so hostile" Frog said, getting his attention on her.

"You think that's hostile! I'll show you hostile!"

"Bah, don't worry about it Tsuyu, it's just Bakugo's way of showing us that he cares."

"Why the hell would I care about you? Give me one damn reason!" Well, really, Spiky Hair was really not all that bad as far as the students of his class went. It was a bit annoying the way the guy had latched onto him like some kind of parasite but for the most part having him as company helped to keep all the others at bay. And helped reduce the visits to the 'guidance counselor's office'; honestly, more like the 'I washed out in hero training but need to do something to pretend like my existence has meaning' office.

"People just want to congratulate you on winning the Festival. Don't get so uppity." Bakugo just rolled his eyes at Rich Girl; even though she did good in all the tests and academics, he did not see her as much of a threat to the position as top hero. She lacked the physical strength to take care of most fights on her own, especially when she couldn't come up with the perfect situation for her quirk. Even then the girl was way too slow with her quirk to make it that useful. These people weren't worth him wasting his energy, he knew it, but he just could not resist trying to put them in their places. To think, someone like her could get into a school like UA based on recommendations; that really, truly pissed him off.

"Hello class," Mr. Aizawa said from the front of the room, getting everyone's attention. "Needless to say, the Sports Festival was a rousing success for all of you. And I see that everyone has made a full recovery, even Midoriya. It is tradition that, following the Festival, students will choose their hero name and be given a week to work under any professional hero that has sent them an offer. This year, we have received the highest number of offers in school history for one class, though not the highest in total across all classes. We are compiling the offers into a list, for your convenience, and they will be passed out later. Congratulations on making this year's Festival one of our most successful."

As if on cue, and Bakugo felt pretty damn sure there actually was a cue, the hero Midnight entered the class, wearing clothing that would get her fired from any other halfway respectable school in the nation. Most of the other guys seemed to be staring at her as she strutted her hips, while the girls looked away somewhat embarrassed by the display. Absolute brain-dead idiots had no idea how easy it would be for that woman to kill them; damn, it was so pathetic. How the hell were these morons even still alive? Cannon fodder had more purpose and direction than these 'people'!

"Hi everyone, great to see you again," she said with a wink, making him roll his eyes while the rest of the class was undoubtedly further entranced. "The hero name you'll be selecting today may not necessarily be your final one, but most heroes do seem to keep it. There's not really any pressure, besides what pressure you assign to it. Just come up with anything you like, and I'm here to make sure it's appropriate." How ironic, the dominatrix talking about being appropriate. What a joke; who the hell actually even thought about stupid shit like hero names for more than two seconds? He looked over at the nerd and was not at all surprised to see Deku looking at the board they'd been given as if it was some sort of sacred relic that could decide his entire future. Bakugo looked at his for one moment before writing something down.

When Bakugo walked calmly to the front of the room, with his board facing his chest, Midnight and the rest of the class looked at him like something was off. After standing there for a second, he flipped the board, revealing his chosen name.

"King Explosion Murder!" He said, in a yell that was pretty much a literal challenge to any of the students to try to deny his title.

"Hmm… I would suggest going for something different. That's not very heroic." The teacher said, causing Bakugo to roll his eyes then go sit down. Why did he have to do this anyway? It's not like his costume really even hid his identity in the first place. Everybody should know him by his real name!

When the elegant 'Lord Explosion Murder' was also declined, he changed his mind and decided that there was no way they were going to force anything out of him today. Listening to the other students walking up, talking about their inspiration, looking all shy before revealing their brilliant hero names, was torture. It was impossible, literally impossible, for him to care even one small bit less about what a bunch of nobodies he would never hear from after graduation were going to call themselves at the unemployment line. At least, until that damned nerd decided to make his hero name 'Deku,' coming up with all kinds of his own reasons why that was heroic. That pissed him off, and he did not entirely know why, so that pissed him off more, and suddenly his good mood for the day was pretty much blown to pieces.

"I'll kill you Deku!" He shouted, and when Spiky Hair told him to calm down, he threatened to kill that moron too. As if the loss of a couple supporting cast members was going to matter to anyone. Of course the nerd was going with Deku, that was his way of trying to assert his superiority. Who the hell did that loser think he was!

"Now that all of your names are out of the way, at least those who chose names," Aizawa was looking at him, and Bakugo was glaring right back. Aizawa may have been able to erase a quirk with a glance, but that didn't mean Bakugo was willing to lose a glaring contest. "I've received all your offers. There was only one student here who did not receive any, but rest assured, we have plans for such occasions."

Bakugo did not receive a sheet of paper so much as he received a small novella, which he immediately began scanning for the top names and agencies. No way was he going to sign-up for anything other than the strongest hero possible but there was a part of him that was sated by the sheer volume of offers. Looking over, he noticed that Deku was the only person who had not received any offers, probably because the nerd almost killed himself every time he fought. Rather than feeling happy about the loser having no offers, though, it actually made him angrier because it meant another way that Deku was oh-so special. Probably was gonna get special training from All Might or something instead, and the thought made Bakugo grit his teeth a bit. .

It was so obvious that the damn Nerd got special attention from All Might; anyone with half a brain would notice it easily. Naturally, that meant Bakugo was the only one to really pick up on it in his class. He didn't quite know why yet; he knew that, in the beginning, any question would just be answered by saying it was a teacher helping out one of the last-placed students in the class. But here they were, damn Deku getting stronger and stronger but the increased attention from All Might not going anywhere. Ignoring that for now, he looked down at the agency information.

Most of the names were meaningless, worthless drabble. Heroes or agencies who could only dream for him to actually accept their offer, in the vague hope that they would be more notable for it. At first, he was sure that he was going to go with Best Jeanist, since that guy was the highest ranking hero who had given him an offer. There was, however, one other name that caught his attention, in particular due to how little he actually knew about it. The hero was pretty well known for never backing down from a fight against villains and for winning even when outnumbered. Of course, everyone would give him the typical 'oh, it's not about winning, it's about the civilians, it's about helping, it's about' and all that nonsense, and of course, they would just forget that All Might had never lost a fight and had saved more people than anyone else. He'd dare them to say that All Might was not a hero because of that, he'd kill them in an instant.

Everybody always wanted to assert their belief that 'heroes focus on the rescue first and foremost' but he never bought into that bullshit. Number One, it was an obvious weak spot for villains to exploit if they knew a hero would go out of their way to try to rescue any random civilian they could grab and endanger. It was on the news all the time; villains escaping because they held some knife to some idiot's neck, hero's quirk was 'not suited for such a scenario,' and the guy gets away to do it again. Number Two, it really didn't matter if the civilians were rescued anyway if the villain got away to plan something else or succeeded in their goal. All Might didn't let the villains get away; he always defeated them, beat them into a pulp.

He was not very familiar with heroes besides All Might because, when Bakugo became the number one hero, they would not really matter all that much. It didn't concern him what their powers were, what their morals were, any of that stuff, if they weren't number one. While he was tempted to go with Jeanist and call it at that, he didn't want to make the wrong decision, so reluctantly decided he would get a bit more information. And, there was only one nerd who would have it conveniently available. Glancing over, it looked like Deku was having a nervous breakdown.

"Deku!" The rest of the class seemed shocked by Bakugo's sudden outburst, as the blond rose and walked over toward Midoriya's desk, looking like he was one step from exploding. Of course, none of them noticed the way that Midoriya was broken out of his trance of self-doubt. Bakugo stood over the green-haired kid, who had a slight smile on his face even as sweat began to form on it. Honestly, Bakugo couldn't help but wonder if the nerd tried hard in order to look so pathetic, like maybe it was some kind of game.

"Y-yes, Kacchan?"

"Hokage." There was silence in the classroom now, caused by his commotion, but it's not like he cared about it. The nerd just stared at him with this weird look in his eye, like he had no idea what he was talking about, and that made him kind of angry because there's no way there was a hero Deku didn't know about. Bakugo slammed his papers on the desk, showing the two names he had underlined. Best Jeanist and Hokage. "I know you have notes in that nerdbook."

There was a sudden look of understanding in the nerd's eyes, and he calmed down as he began to transition comfortably to his favorite topic of hero discussion. "You got an offer from Best Jeanist? And Hokage too! Wow Kacchan, that's really impressive."

"Hokage!" The rest of the so-called 'students' were looking at him now, probably jealous that they weren't going to get to work with any top heroes or something. Maybe, just maybe, they should start trying to be less pathetic so they would get offers from people who weren't helping old ladies cross the street as their top priority assignment. It's not that he cared about getting offers from these two, not really, because they were not the top hero and that meant there were people better than them. He would be one of them, if he was not already. Morons like his classmates would probably have the audacity to be satisfied if they received offers from some of the most well-known heroes. Losers.

"O-oh, right, Hokage." The nerd flipped through his notebook until eventually he found the name. "Umm… well, the name Hokage is actually associated with a first generation hero. It's safe to say, though, that the person bearing the name has changed several times since their abilities have been different. The forum I'm on, uh, I mean, the people I know" the nerd did that awkward laugh he always did whenever he embarrassed himself by being such a nerd, "most of them put their guesses on the number of heroes that have been Hokage between four and six. Some of them even go into the teens because Hokage has been seen doing a wide variety of techniques that they don't think can be done by one person. A few say it's as low as two, saying that Hokage could just have a very unique quirk that he's passed on from father to son.

His quirk has always been registered as 'Energy manipulation' but uses such a wide variety of attacks that most people think there's more to it than that. In his debut, the first Hokage could make trees grow out of nowhere and he was later seen to fight while running or standing on top of water! But, there's not much video on him overall really. At least, not enough to pinpoint transitions. He doesn't have a known agency and is thought to work alone, but that doesn't make any sense since he's known to show up in a wide variety of places so at least has informants. Umm… what else… oh, he's known to only show up when things seem to be at their worst; some people say it's to make him look better, some people say it's because he doesn't want to step in unless he has to."

"Why is he not in the hero rankings?" Bakugo was not surprised at all at the thorough detail Deku had about one of the more mysterious yet well-known heroes, but the same could not be said for the rest of the classmates who continued to be surprised at Midoriya's note-taking abilities. The thought crossed his mind how they were so infantile in the way they forgot these types of things; it's like his classmates were babies, their mothers held the keys in front of their faces, they found those keys the most interesting things in existence, then the keys were taken away and they forgot they were ever there. It was the only explanation as to how they could be surprised at Deku's nerdiness.

"It's impossible to really say when this Hokage began and the others ended; which footage of him is the current and what's a predecessor. So, I guess they just don't want to include him. But, it's pretty obvious from what we've seen that his strength is in the top five, for sure. Regardless of however many people have used the name Hokage, they have all been incredibly strong."

The entire situation was definitely starting to intrigue him; an incredibly strong hero who only shows up when things are rough and didn't have to worry about fighting purse-snatchers all the time? Sounded interesting. Definitely silly to not want to be included in the rankings though; what was the point in being strong if nobody recognized how strong you were? Without another word, Bakugo turned around and walked back to his desk.

"I always thought Hokage seemed like a real cool hero; he's definitely more your style than Best Jeanist," For the first time perhaps in his entire life, Spiky Hair actually had a point Jeanist seemed like the type of guy who woke up at four in the morning, ironed his clothes for two hours, then did his hair for two hours, then went on patrol to have everyone talk about how stylish he is. Still, the guy was rated as the number four hero, but how much did that really mean? The gap between 1 and 3 was about as big as the gap from 3 to 40, so great was All Might's ability. What, then, would even be the point of making himself endure a week in that guy's company when they probably were not gonna get along. Besides, the whole 'Hokage' thing did have a mysterious angle that he couldn't prevent himself from finding interesting.

"Shut the hell up," Bakugo said; but having not said it in a very loud way made it clear to him from the look on Spiky Hair's face that he took it more along the lines of 'Yeah, you're right.' Sometimes he really had to remind himself the level of people he was dealing with in this classroom and that he couldn't relent even for a second if he were going to keep them at bay.

"But Best Jeanist is the number four hero! That's a hard offer to turn down!" He turned to Deku, staring daggers at the boy, probably because the nerd was right but he had already thought through that whole dilemma. Why was everyone else always so damn slow!

"Hokage's a smart guy; not sure what exactly he has planned for Bakugo but I think I can hazard a guess," Aizawa said. "Regardless, as far as I am aware, this is the first year he has ever sent in an offer so I think something must have caught his eye. He is what we call a 'Gray Market' Hero; all sorts of holes in his official registration, from his name to his quirk to his work address. They say no one's seen the true face of any Hokage. Keeps things mysterious, pretty frowned upon in modern hero work but worth remembering that All Might does the same. Probably better just to go to Best Jeanist so he can get your act cleaned up and introduce you to real heroism."

There was something so unbelievably infuriating about not knowing the answer to something right in front of him; it really pissed him off. Aizawa knew, the guy absolutely knew, that his words would make him less likely to pick Jeanist. So the question, then, was why did Aizawa care about who he went off to anyway; it was just gonna be a week! Probably not even gonna matter for anything in the long run.

"You know Hokage, sensei? They say he's pretty picky about interacting with people," the damn nerd asked, as if it had anything to do with him. At this point, he was finding it a little interesting that Aizawa and Deku were referring to Hokage as a 'he' even though the hero name was associated with several people according to the nerd's own damned research. Had every Hokage been anti-social? Had his teacher even interacted with the current iteration of Hokage? Was he the only one who bothered with asking these questions?

"Meh, the job forces you to meet people. Don't really know anything much more than you though so don't read into it too much."

Bakugo almost needed to walk out of the room to escape the smell of bullshit. If Aizawa wanted him to, for some reason, take the Hokage offer over the Jeanist offer, then the guy really should have just said something. His sensei's futile efforts in trying to psychologically manipulate him were irritating at best and absolutely ineffective because he had already figured it out. If anything, it was damned insulting that the guy thought he would not notice it.

Well, maybe there was some effect, because there was no damn way he was going to go get pampered by some professional denim wearing nutcase.

"I'm going with Hokage!"

"Nobody cares."

Spiky Hair had the nerve to hold him back.

* * *

beta read by: the road I know

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone. I've decided I'm going to start cross-posting my writing over here on AO3. I'm giving it a little time to make sure that I'm doing everything right and that the tags/etc are all good but the goal is to have all my completed/in-progress work on this site rather soon. I don't promise anything regarding update speed, but do know that the next few chapters are already uploaded elsewhere and should be up soon. Also, I don't plan on including any pairings, but if there are canon pairings for My Hero by the time I'm finished then I might.
> 
> Thank you for reading. Please feel free to kudos/comment/bookmark or simply continue onward.


	2. First Meeting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bakugo's week of interning under Hokage begins!

Now, some people would say that Bakugo was never happy; this much was untrue. There were occasions when he felt plenty happy but the idiots around him were just unable to discern the difference because he didn't start acting like he was hyped up on drugs like they did. On this particular day, however, he was feeling an extreme dose of unhappiness and, while some people might not notice his happiness, everybody could notice his unhappiness.

The seat in front of him was empty, the seat behind him was vacated, and the seat next to him was practically quarantined. The intense scowl on his face prevented even the noblest of citizens from attempting conversation and, when he looked at one girl who was crying about dropping something, she halted and hugged herself into her mother's chest when his red eyes landed on her. For a lot of fellow riders, they were probably made uneasy because they recognized him from the Sports Festival and knew one of their passengers was clearly pissed off and capable of destroying the whole thing in the blink of an eye.

What made him so unhappy? Well, Hokage did not give a proper address, instead, giving the title of a train to get on and instructing him to get off at a small stop that turned out to be another hour of travel away. He hated having his time wasted and he hated being expected to play along with this stupid little game. When Bakugo stood up and walked toward the door after having finally reached his stop, the other riders held their breaths in anticipation that something terrible was going to happen. When he got off, they collectively breathed a sigh of relief. This reaction was much different from Bakugo who, standing for a minute, was not approached by anybody and realized that he now had no idea where he was going.

"Damn it!" He yelled and, when one mom gave him a stink eye for public profanity, his glare was easily enough to make her rethink her position. Nothing else to do, he started walking just for the sake of walking. He knew that people who were lost should stay in the same position for someone to find them, but there was no way he was just going to stand there after wasting so much time on those trains. Noticing now that he was feeling hungry, he decided to try to grab a bite to eat; unfortunately, looking at the selection of foods, the best summary he could think of to describe them was piss poor selection with ludicrous prices. Deciding not to pay for any of that, he then left the small station altogether because, at that point it was so late that if the guy showed up then fuck him. Feeling like his wallet had no other choice, he settled on a small ramen stand that was only made to sit eight people and only one seat was even taken. That did not get his hopes up about a quality meal but at least it'd probably be edible. It better be.

"Miso," he said between gritted teeth to the woman who greeted him. He thought she might have given a name or something but didn't even hear it. It only took a brief moment to get annoyed by the guy sitting two seats to his left, who was slurping his ramen as if the entire food were destined to be wiped from existence in five minutes and he needed to devour as much as possible before it happened. "Hey buddy, how about you shut the hell up with your eating!" Then he looked over, and felt a little bad, because the guy was wearing a black tracksuit with orange on the side and orange pants and, though most people may not realize, he tried not to be so mean to the mentally handicapped. It's not like they'd even get it. The man was blond, a much yellower blond than his own, and seemed to be probably two years or so older. It was also worth noting that there were many empty ramen bowls in front of the guy.

"Sorry, guess I got a bit carried away" the guy said with a laugh, rubbing his neck, as Bakugo turned away from him and waited for his food with fingers tapping on the counter. "Oh hey, you're Katsuki Bakugo aren't you?"

"What about it?"

"I was hired to take you to Hokage! My name is Naruto Uzumaki."

Fury. That was the only word to describe the feeling that overcame Bakugo in that moment. He was so angry he could hardly think about what an unbelievably stupid name it was. Seriously, what kind of idiots want a child then name it 'Naruto'? It was practically child abuse.

"Then WHY weren't you at the train station, damn it!"

"Guess I got distracted." That laugh was gonna make him kill this guy, he was sure of it. "Oh, don't look upset, it was an honest mistake! But don't tell Hokage about it, yeah? Don't want him mad at me."

"You'll be lucky if you ever make it back to him, shit head!"

"You were awesome in the Sports Festival, by the way. Definitely the most entertaining guy to watch. Loved the way you just walked right up and said you were gonna win; crowd reaction was golden! Knew every time they put you on the screen it was going to be awesome." The guy moved on in the 'conversation' with no acknowledgment at all of what Bakugo had said, much to his annoyance.

"One miso ramen, sir," the girl said cautiously, looking at the other occupant as if she were worried. Then again, with as many bowls as that guy had already eaten, he probably kept the place running. Bakugo turned back to face the counter, and took perhaps the most furious bite of ramen in all known history. And, to his immense surprise, it was actually very good. Possibly the best ramen he'd ever had, come to think of it. He took another look at it, as if to confirm that it was actually that food generally associated with being cheap and tasteless.

"Oh wow, look at the time! We can't afford to just sit around. Thanks for the meal Ayame!" Naruto took out a surprisingly large amount of cash, slapped it on the counter, then grabbed Bakugo and started rushing away from the stand.

"Are you crazy! Keep your hands off me! And I was eating!" Bakugo forcefully removed Naruto's hand but continued running alongside him through the small town even as people were looking at them funnily for some reason.

"It's a long way to Hokage's, couldn't waste any more time. We need to keep a good pace."

Bakugo was panting, and he found it hard to believe that he could be breathing hard while the Naruto guy seemed perfectly composed. Maybe there was something to the guy's ramen intake that powered his quirk because this was insane. Bakugo knew he had great endurance, and rarely tired in a battle, and never asked to take a break during class, but here they were. They'd been running fairly fast for almost two hours now, deep into the hilly forests of the region, and were now fully enveloped by trees on every side for as far as he could see. As if the running weren't bad enough, the guy kept bursting into talking pretty regularly too.

"Anyway, after that, I met this nice girl, well, maybe nice isn't the best way to describe her but I think she's nice, in one of my classes and we seemed to hit it off. I thought I loved her, you know, high-school sweetheart and all that, but she kept rejecting me all the time. For a while, I was heartbroken, but then..."

"I don't care, just shut the hell up!" Bakugo loudly interrupted, begging for relief of some kind from the never ending tales of the guy's personal life. There was a short moment of silence, with Naruto looking at him briefly with a blank expression on his face, and Bakugo thought maybe the blond had finally caught on, but then it was broken.

"Like I was saying, I met this friend of mine named Lee; I guess we weren't friends at first, but we're friends now, and he's a real crazy guy. Really kept my mind off her with his shenanigans. Then again, he also liked the same girl, so I guess that was a bit weird..."

"Oh my God, just shut up!" There were some people who could not take a hint; Bakugo knew many of them. Others seemed able to pick up on every small detail, noticed everything. And then there was this guy, whom Bakugo was sure could only be successfully talked to by arranging helicopter spotlights into words to get his attention. Although, admittedly, it was ridiculous that the guy could run for so long, barely break a sweat, and almost constantly keep talking.

"Just trying to break the monotony, Bakkun."

"What. The fuck. Did you just call me?" Normally, he would have yelled, but this time, the anger was so intense that it came out gruffly through gritted teeth.

"Bakkun; I don't know, just seems to really fit you."

"Die!" Without further warning, Bakugo felt himself snap and he unleashed a huge explosion where Naruto was standing. Before the smoke even cleared, he began to cause smaller and smaller explosions. "Die! Die! Die!" He stood there, for a minute or two afterwards, red eyes staring at the area he had bombarded, practically daring any living creature to show up around it. When he could finally see the damage, there was a crater, a rather large one, but no body.

"That's not much of a heroic catchphrase. Die die die die?" He heard a high-pitched voice taunting him from somewhere, but as he looked around in the trees, he wasn't able to make out anybody; judging from the direction of the voice, he knew it was somewhere in front of him. And it was definitely not Naruto's voice. "Now, why'd you have to get rid of our guide? I was hoping he'd finally lead me to Hokage."

"Well, I don't think he's dead," Bakugo said, still trying to identify wherever the other voice was. "No way those blasts would have destroyed the remains. Don't know where the hell he went, but I'm damn thankful it's somewhere else."

"But then how are you going to deal with my surprise?"

Suddenly there were footsteps behind Bakugo, approaching him quickly, so he fell to the ground, did a quick 180 spin, and fired off a huge explosion before even identifying an enemy. Clearly, whoever was talking had hostile intentions so there was no point in beating around the bush when it came to murdering whoever showed up. There were two options: Option One was that a villain of some kind had actually followed them for two hours, keeping up with his and Naruto's pace the whole time, and Option Two was that this was a training exercise from Hokage. Bakugo knew which option he was willing to go with. If he actually killed somebody then it was their fault for underestimating him.

As the smoke from the explosion cleared, there was a figure standing in it. From the general outline, Bakugo saw that it was someone about the same height as him; as it cleared a little more, he could tell the person also had the same hairstyle and same attire as his. Then the smoke was gone, and he had to admit he was more than a little confused when he saw himself standing there, a crooked mischievous smile on its-his?-face. Surely this had to be quirk related in some way, but it seemed unlikely that it could be something to do with Hokage since Deku had said the quirk was 'Energy Manipulation;' then again, nerd also said there could be more to it.

"Hey hey Bakugo, good to finally meet ya." The voice was even the same as his! What the hell!

"What the hell is going on here?"

"I've known about you since before the Sports Festival, Bakugo." It was the mysterious voice from earlier that spoke again. "Remember that incident where you were taken captive? I could tell even then that you were special and would be worth pursuing with my particular talents. That inspired my newest line of products; anyway, I'd appreciate if you would help me with the bug testing."

"Shut up and die!" He let loose explosion after explosion at the copy of himself because, whether this was a real villain fight or not, that thing was definitely going to die. Unfortunately, it was actually really fast and seamlessly avoided all of his attacks. Next thing he knew, it was right on top of him and throwing a bunch of punches and kicks that he had a difficult time avoiding. It didn't really have the same fighting style, but it was similar, like a cheap imitation. Looking into the thing's red eyes, the way it was smiling at him, it was making him angrier by the second. Forced to fight a cheap bargain bin knockoff of himself; what a joke!

Using an explosion to propel himself quickly backward, he drew his hands together and quickly caused a huge explosion in the entire area in front of him. If nothing else, the run here had given him plenty of fuel to be able to use in this fight. Without waiting to know if the attack hit, he thrust his hands forward and aimed a series of smaller explosions across a wide area to ensure at least one of them did some damage.

"Good try." The voice was behind him but before Bakugo could even react, he found his feet kicked out from under him by a leg sweep and was then hit with a hard punch that knocked him back through the air until he was able to regain his balance. With a grimace, he admitted to himself that this opponent he was fighting was definitely above average. That damn smile, looking at him like the copy was in someway superior. Alright, that was it, this guy was clearly a tough opponent so he was going to make sure he went all-out from now on.

"You think you're better than me!?" His opponent was strong enough that his punches hurt a fair bit but it was nothing that he couldn't endure. The main problem was the speed; the copy of himself was just way faster and there was no denying that. So he needed to come up with a way to mitigate his speed disadvantage. His opponent had thus far shown no obvious sign of quirk usage and, though it looked like some kind of copy of himself, it seemed incredibly unlikely that it would be able to use the same explosive power especially if it had not already. He needed to exploit the advantage for everything he could.

Rushing in, he led with a right hook, but before the copy could block, Bakugo used his left hand to blast himself slightly to the right and then launched the attack. But in the last second before it connected, the thing somehow tilted backwards, narrowly avoiding the blow, before bringing up a knee that hit Bakugo solidly in the stomach. It attempted to follow up with a punch, but that plan was ruined when Bakugo put a hand in front of its face and attempted to blast it point-blank. In order to avoid the attack the knockoff launched itself to the left and Bakugo was sent backwards from the recoil. That engagement, though he had taken a hit, had definitely gone better because he was close to landing a few knockout hits whereas the copy was gonna need a lot more hits if it wanted to do much to him.

The thing then took its turn to attack, swinging quickly and bouncing from side to side, seemingly effortlessly, in a flurry of movement. Bakugo used small bursts to keep himself slightly out of reach, understanding at this point that his speed without using his quirk was just not quite enough to handle a fist fight. He tried to land a close range hit on the copy but the thing seemed to understand his intention from the way it constantly managed to dodge it. Finally, it broke off its attack and this particular clash could be deemed a total draw.

Naturally, this pissed Bakugo off. "I am the best, you damn knockoff!" He charged in, firing a series of explosions behind himself to increase his speed and leading with a right knee. But the thing was able to dodge it, and attacked with a right jab. Bakugo took the hit in the side of his torso, and quickly wrapping its hand underneath his arm, trapped the copy in front of him. A smile lit up his face as he brought in his other hand for the explosive kill; but to his surprise, the knockoff jumped, twisting overhead and using its free hand to throw him into a tree, bark splintering as the wind was knocked out of him. He stood, ignoring the pain, panting as he tried to catch his breath.

The stupid thing was grinning at him as it spoke. "Is this seriously the best you have? What a joke."

Bakugo was regretting his casual clothes at the moment because he was pretty sure a solid blast from his grenade bracelets could end this whole charade in a flash. Unfortunately, those were currently in his backpack and were not an option. The copy rushed at him, and briefly, Bakugo allowed himself to wonder at the oddity of being attacked by himself. Some psychologist somewhere would just eat that shit up. Suddenly Bakugo smiled maliciously, causing his opponent to halt in its tracks. "Hah, hell no, I just didn't feel like messing up my clothes!"

The air around them was practically overflowing with nitroglycerin due to the fact that he had already been sweating when he got there. Normally, Bakugo would make more of an effort to restrict his explosions so he wouldn't run out of material, but right now, he could hardly care less about any of that. He was determined to win this fight. A laugh escaped him as he clapped his hands together. The resulting explosion rocked the section of the forest, killing several trees in the process as the experimental move ignited the air surrounding him in one gigantic fireworks display, clearing the area around him for five meters.

He was breathing even heavier after the move, his arms aching from its usage and his body somewhat hurt by the blast. He knew he had not been fully ready to add it officially to his arsenal but supposed things could have been worse. Looking around, he saw no sign of his opponent and that brought a huge smile to his face even as he looked down and saw the state his clothes were in. Mom was definitely gonna nag him for that one. Oh well, at least he had gotten a decent fight out of it. Way better than that damn Sports Festival.

"Wow, Bakugo-kun, you sure are strong!" It was that same high-pitched voice from earlier, but this time it coincided with the appearance of a figure wearing dark robes and an orange mask that seemed to have a swirl built into its design and only an eye hole for the right eye. "I knew it was going to be a good fight, but thought for sure my creation would pull through! I spent so much time designing and programming it for just this occasion. You really messed up my plans, you know that?"

"Who the hell are you?"

"He goes by Tobi." A voice came from behind, a little deep and a little gruff, before a figure appeared beside Bakugo. The man beside him was a fair bit taller than him, wearing white robes with a flame design on the bottom that stretched into a hood that covered his head and down about to his knees. Underneath the robes he seemed to be wearing blue pants with a green shirt. He had numerous pouches attached to his belt as well, but maybe the weirdest thing was his mask. A white mask with various touches of red on the forehead, three stripes on either cheek, and fox ears that identified this man as the hero Hokage. The Kitsune mask met perfectly with the hood, making it impossible to see any of the hero's features. "He's a relatively unknown villain but definitely a dangerous one."

"Ah, Hokage-san! I was hoping to finally find your secret lair but little Bakugo-kun messed that up for me. Oh well!" The guy sure sounded light-hearted for what seemed to be a stand-off between heroes and a villain.

"I suspected you'd tail him, that's why we're all the way out here. Do you think it was a coincidence that the easiest transportation option was not taken? You didn't really think it would be that easy, did you Tobi?"

"Right right, fair enough. Clever as a Kitsune, eh Hokage?" Suddenly, Tobi went from unknown villain to the very top of Bakugo's kill list for saying something that monumentally stupid. "Well, I best be leaving now. I have a lot of work to do!"

"And why should I let you leave?"

"Ooh! Ooh! Tobi knows!" This guy was a villain? For real? "Because you need to look after your little protege and you couldn't stop me anyway. Now tell me what I win!"

"Death!" Shouted a voice that Bakugo recognized, with a scowl, as Naruto's. Turns out the guy had not been obliterated earlier, much to his disappointment though not to his surprise. A second later, he was shocked to see a knife of some kind go right through the villain's chest, where his heart should have been, without any sign of contact whatsoever. No blood on it or anything, villain did not even move! Definitely meant he had some kind of spatial quirk but was it always active or did the guy somehow hear the idiot coming from behind? Naruto fell to the ground, and tumbled before coming to his feet in a fighting stance facing Tobi.

"Nice try! Better luck next time!" The mysterious villain then proceeded to run away, very fast, Bakugo noted, into the trees back in the direction he and Naruto had come from.

"His creations are getting stronger," Hokage said beside him in a whisper.

"Creations? There's more? And what the hell was that? Actually, what the hell has this whole day been!"

"In due time. Are you injured?"

"Nah, bastard barely landed a hit." That much may have been an exaggeration; Bakugo knew for sure he was going to have a few bruises from the clash. Still, he was standing, and the fake Bakugo was obliterated from the face of the Earth. Call it a victory. He wouldn't have minded getting a chance to fight that villain though; spatial quirks were generally rare and after that whole annoying USJ incident he would have liked the chance to get some payback on one.

"Glad to hear you're okay Bakkun!" He glared at the older blond, that nickname enough to already revive the fighting spirit inside of him even so soon after a fight. It was already challenging enough not to kill the nerd for calling him a damn stupid kid name; he did not need another one!

"Don't call me that! And why the hell did you disappear? Are you some kind of coward!?"

"I knew Tobi was around so I went to get Hokage."

"I apologize for the sloppiness of this arrangement so far, Bakugo-san. I had thought the directions should have prevented anyone from following you, but Tobi somehow knew to be at that village, so it was just a waste of your time."

"Suppose you had your reasons." Hokage, so far, seemed decent enough. Naruto, however… "Wish you could have had someone else bring me, though, that blond idiot's annoying as hell."

"Were it anyone else I do not think I could have been informed in time to prevent Tobi taking you, which he surely would have done once you defeated his creation."

"You say creation; Mask-Man said he programmed and designed it. Is it a robot or something like that?" He had to admit he was interested in learning a bit more about this because the guy's abilities reminded him a lot of that void thing that appeared during the attack at USJ. And then, hadn't that giant thing that All-Might beat also been created? But there didn't seem to actually be anything else in common between the two, considering they looked nothing alike and the thing at USJ had quirks whereas his opponent today had not. He also refused to acknowledge that the Naruto guy could have been helpful in any way, considering the guy was gone before the fighting even started.

"I'm fairly certain it is not, but I do not know what it is. I only know that he has shown up with several over the past three years, each stronger and more human-like in personality than the last. They have different appearances each time as well, always a hero of some kind. But, enough of that for now. As I said, in due time. I've been looking forward to speaking to you for some time now, Bakugo-san, about matters other than this. Had it gone my way you would not even know of these things at all, they serve no purpose for you. Let us go to my home and discuss over dinner, sound nice?"

"You said earlier that you suspected I would be tailed. Are we actually even near your home?"

"Yes; that was mostly a bluff. I doubt Tobi actually bought it; he's not so stupid as he acts. Moving at a decent speed we should be ten minutes away." Well then, if the house was ten minutes away at a quick pace, and it had been at most four minutes between the time Naruto vanished and Hokage appeared, that meant they both had to be pretty damn fast.

"Boss had us take the long route this time; next time I'm pretty sure it'll be a little more direct." Naruto had a smile on his face, the type that told Bakugo the guy must have intended some kind of humor in the statement but he had no idea what. Blond idiot's probably just amused whenever he manages to put together a thought.

But Hokage, seemed alright in his book. So far, he wasn't an overbearing asshole and that was more than he could say for most of the other pro-heroes out there. Plus, Bakugo had already gotten in pretty great fight and went up against a serious villain. Even if the Naruto guy was pretty annoying and the travel to get to this point was rage-inducing, he guessed he wasn't regretting his decision to choose Hokage just yet. But then his stomach growled, erasing his good mood and reminding him exactly how annoying the idiot blond was going to make this week.. "Alright then; what are we standing around for. Let's go."

"Hehe, you're so serious Bakkun! … Are you growling at me?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> beta read by: the road I know
> 
> Hokage's outfit can be best described as the Hokage robe from the anime, with a hood instead of a hat, and a kitsune mask added. Not much more to say about things for the moment. 
> 
> Please feel free to kudos/comment/bookmark/anything. As always, thank you for reading!


	3. Dinner Discussion

"Welcome to our little piece of paradise Bakkun! We call it Konohagakure no Sato!"

Konohagakure, Hokage's 'lair,' as Mask-Man had called it, turned out be a traditional styled house in a small clearing among a dense patch of forest that was indeed quite near where their fight had taken place. It seemed very small to Bakugo and, given how far away it was from anything, he had to wonder if it were actually where Hokage spent most of his time; it had to be difficult to reach major cities from there in time to respond to a villain fight. Then again, he was willing to bet there was some easier method of access than the indirect route he'd been forced to take.

"Konohagakure no Sato, huh? That seems a bit dramatic. It's just one old house, not a village."

"The first Hokage had a bit of a sense of humor when it came to naming things, hehe." Naruto chuckled lightly. "Well I guess it was actually his friend who named it but it wasn't like he disagreed much on the topic. Just call it Konoha for short."

Hokage had already disappeared into the kitchen, and after his little introduction of the house, Naruto thankfully disappeared somewhere else, leaving Bakugo alone in what he would call the living room but that seemed to also serve as the dining room. He sat down at the square table by the wall and looked around impatiently. The table was small, with only four chairs around it, and a few feet away, there was a couch and a nightstand; these few pieces of furniture made up the entire room.

After a time period best described as too damn long, the other two joined him, Hokage carrying the food. Thankfully, Naruto was too caught up staring at the meal to bother talking about anything else. "Itadakimasu!" he said, digging rather aggressively into his fish, rice, and other sides. Briefly he noted that Hokage still had his mask on, despite the fact that he was holding utensils and was clearly intent on eating. Bakugo looked down and took a sizable bite, and when he looked up again, he saw that there was slightly less food on Hokage's plate than there had been only seconds before. A bit confused, he looked down at his plate and speared another bite, and just like before, when he looked up he saw less food on the hero's plate with no obvious indication the guy had moved in any way or adjusted his mask. How the hell?

But if Hokage noticed Bakugo's stare, he ignored it. "I am quite grateful you decided to choose me for this training, Bakugo-san. I think we will find it a pleasant arrangement for all of us."

"Oh come on, there's no way he wouldn't choose you Boss!"

"Someone of Bakugo-san's caliber undoubtedly had many other offers; it would be wrong to take his acceptance for granted." One thing Bakugo was quickly finding out about Hokage was that he was a difficult person to read. Normally, he could tell easily from a person's eyes, mouth, or even the way their face contorted whether they were telling the truth. With this guy, though, it was impossible due to the mask and the way he was able to maintain such a constant tone of voice.

"Yeah yeah, what's the big deal about it anyway? It's just a week." Honestly, Bakugo did not understand why people like Deku, Aizawa, and now Hokage treated it like it was actually important. It was nothing but a week of learning about hero work directly from a pro hero; at the end of the day, it's not like it was gonna be something important that changed anyone's life. The upcoming week was just another seven days of his life.

"There is much that can be done in a week, especially with sufficient motivation. Typically, this period is used as a way for students such as yourself to get a brief introduction to hero work, to see what a real hero is like and to prepare you for the profession. Do some patrols, learn some paperwork, introduce you to the business. All those things."

"You said typically." Bakugo glanced around again. It was hard to imagine they would be getting much in the way of normal business done in such a rural, secluded location.

"Indeed. I'm much more interested in helping you learn and grow than anything else. You'll be taught those things eventually in your school anyway, and if you never want to handle the business and paperwork, someone of your abilities will be able to hire people to manage it soon after starting. Besides, if you learn nothing else about me, it will be that I do not exactly do much normal hero work."

"Hah, and you think you can help me with my training?" Except for the times the school curriculum or coursework forced him to train with one of his loser classmates, Bakugo did all of his training alone. He was not about to show them any of the techniques he was working on or how he got to be so good. If they wanted to improve, they needed to learn to do it on their own like he did. It'd be a waste of his time to hold himself back enough not to kill the idiots. While everyone else at the school went to their rooms to complain about how tough their training had been, he spent the time training more. When everyone else stressed over an exam, he prepared to destroy it.

"Of course; even at your current level, you could compete with a surprising number of professional heroes. However, you cannot let that get to your head; you have a lot of room to improve still and I think the sparring I have planned will help with that. Tell me, do you know anything of my quirk?"

"Yeah; Deku said it was energy manipulation but that there might be more to it. You're known to have a wide variety of techniques, so it has to be something general, something that has a simple effect but can be used in complex ways. Not like that dumbass with the stomach laser; something that, by itself, has little use but is trained to be useful."

"That is generally correct, I suppose. You are very bright to have figured out so much already. You see, my body has an increased yield from cellular respiration, resulting in surplus energy being created from the process. This surplus energy, then, flows freely throughout my body and my quirk allows me to control it to perform many techniques. The Hokage have called it chakra though I've heard it called Aura or Ki by others. So far, it seems like there is no limit to the feats it can perform." The man then held his fingers in a cross sign in front of himself for a second and, a moment later, Bakugo was surprised to see a second Hokage appear beside the first.

"Wh-what the hell? How can energy manipulation do something like that?"

"I call it a 'Shadow Clone;' basically, chakra leaves my body in a controlled way then amalgamates into a seemingly physical form. There's no true physical nature to the clone, however; it can use the chakra given to it to use some of my techniques, and to allow it to hit others, but it cannot actually take a hit itself." Hokage then casually lifted his hand and hit the clone with a fair bit of force, which caused it to vanish into a puff of smoke.

Whatever Bakugo had been expecting the guy to be able to do with his quirk, that was definitely not it. It didn't take a genius to see how being able to create a partner that could handle a bit of the fight would be advantageous, even if it was a bit cowardly. By itself it would be a decent enough quirk but it would always be limited by the physical abilities of the person possessing it; someone with just that quirk could never be a top five hero. However, having such an ability be just a side-effect of a quirk was completely different; it would have almost limitless utility. Not the first time he'd heard of a more general quirk that was superior to a specific quirk. After all, whatever All Might's quirk was it was definitely better than just high strength or high speed.

One thing immediately stood out to him about it, though. "How can it give a hit but not take a hit?"

"By concentrating the chakra to the arms and legs it can deliver an attack that is physical in nature but it does not do this in defense. Well, I suppose it would be possible for it to work in defense, but I am not a defensive fighter and it would take extremely quick reaction times and chakra control to pull off. I doubt it would really be worth the time."

Interesting; another hero who liked to be on the attack like All Might. And apparently he lived by it so much that he was not even sure if his so-called 'clones' were even actually capable of survival on defense. But something else Hokage had said stood out to him. "You said 'The Hokage' called it chakra. That confirms there's been at least a few, and that they've all also used this chakra. But only the first one has been seen making trees grow. That means there's gotta be more to it." Normally he really would not care too much at all about any quirk that was not his; however, there was a part of him that could not just sit there without trying to piece together a bit of the puzzle.

"The uses for chakra are affected somewhat by the personality of the user. While that's all I will say about it for now, I will add one thing: there are many more people who are known to have used chakra than there have been Hokage. Many people will never know they have the ability; they may live their lives thinking they have no quirk or a very minor quirk. Some exceptional people, however, will learn to use the power themselves in very specific ways that they will register as something else. They can, of course, be either heroes or villains."

"So how is any of this going to be useful for my training?" His curiosity was sated about the subject of the strange quirk, at least for now. It was very interesting that it popped up in various places with some frequency and was not exactly the same for everyone but a part of him wondered if that was even the truth of the matter. After all, how could Hokage possibly know whether some guy with the ability to grow trees was actually using chakra or not? It seemed like something that couldn't be confirmed, meaning it was a guess, meaning it was not worth his time.

"I can control the strength of one individual shadow clone based on the amount of chakra involved in creating it. To start your training you will begin by facing a clone at about ten percent strength. If you can beat it, then I will increase it to twenty percent. And so on."

"You actually think you can beat me at ten percent? Yeah fuckin' right!" There was no way that even a top level hero working at ten percent strength could be a match for him in a fight, he was sure about that. Hell, he KNEW at his current level he could take down a large number of the lesser heroes so it was insane to think anybody at one-tenth of their strength could handle him. It didn't matter one damn bit that his body was sore from the fight today; anyone who thought they could take him likely didn't stand a chance.

"Please, you wouldn't stand a chance against the Boss going all out; you'll be lucky to even take down one clone!" Naruto said, to which Bakugo growled.

"So how about you then? You feelin' up to it?" He'd put the stupid blond to the test any time and drive him into the dirt. Nothing wrong with a little 'sparring incident' to get rid of an annoying bastard. Besides, it would be interesting to know how that idiot fought; he already knew the guy had very good stamina and was extremely fast. He had no way of knowing whether that speed was quirk-related or not though. Meanwhile, Naruto was grinning at him, and the mischievous look in his eyes was way too confident; Bakugo was gonna absolutely wipe the floor with him.

"Naruto shall not do any fighting. He has other responsibilities."

"Come on Boss, just one round?"

"This is not open for discussion." Hokage's voice was a bit more stern than it had been at any other point so far. "And as to your earlier question, no, I do not expect to beat you at ten percent."

Bakugo just scoffed at not being able to fight the annoying blond. "Who the hell is this moron? And why's he even here?"

"Bakugo-san, how many people do you think know the location of this hideout? I can assure you it is very few. That Naruto stays here with me should assure you of his importance." Not exactly what he was asking, but whatever, he knew how to tell when people didn't want to give an answer. He couldn't help but wonder, though; if only a few trusted people knew where Hokage lived/operated from, then why the hell had be been invited? "The two of you shall not engage in any sort of combat, for any reason. This rule will not be broken, do you understand me Naruto?" Bakugo was about ready to just roll his eyes but was somewhat surprised that Naruto was the one getting called out. Even if he would wipe the floor with the idiot, it made him grin a bit to see him get in trouble.

"Bakkun, your smile is really something else. You look like you're about to launch into a monologue with a hero chained to a table."

"Did you just call me a villain!?"

"Oh, uh, no, well, you might have some villainous qualities…like that look on your face right now!"

"Bakugo-san, do you know the major flaw I saw with your performance at the Sports Festival?" Bakugo shifted his attention away from the idiot's imminent death when Hokage started talking. "The one thing above all else that bothered me? Oh sure, I could repeat what I've heard from other heroes. That you have non-heroic qualities, you are brash and overly aggressive. Prone to being overly emotional. But, I'm not one to repeat slander about a person's character. It was apparent to me that despite your aggressive nature, you were operating with a keen sense of how to use your abilities to achieve victory. No, the one glaring weakness was your lack of combat experience. Though, to be fair, it was noticeable in all of you."

At hearing he had been called non-heroic and overly aggressive, he had almost exploded. Whoever had called him that were worthless scum trash unworthy of the profession and too scared to ever say anything like that to his face. Bunch of bastards didn't know a damn thing and that's why they'd never be on top!

But there was a certain calmness in Hokage's voice that made him decide to let the hero speak. As the man kept talking, Bakugo found himself returning to his usual calm self. "I must confess, I know little about the training at UA. But, even if you get to spar against your fellow classmates, I doubt it is real enough combat to truly push yourself to improve. And, for someone such as yourself, at the top of your class, it would probably still not be enough. Society wants to hold you back, to try to protect you and your classmates because you are children. But, unless something changes it is a simple fact that you will not have time to fully develop before you face villains again. You're going to need fights that you have a low chance of winning against opponents with moves that you don't know if you are going to be ready to take on villainy anytime soon. I can provide that."

"Hah, you really think those silly clones will be able to take me on? I'm ready to fight you full strength, right here and now!"

"Very well; I suppose we can since my dinner has been finished."

Bakugo looked down at the man's plate, hardly believing he had somehow managed to eat all of it with a mask on. He had not even seen the guy take a single bite; seriously, how the hell was he doing that? "We can begin immediately."

"Damn straight! Immediately after I finish my food!" While he knew he could push himself to go on without eating, because his body would obey anything he told it to do or else, the meal was already served and he had already taken a few bites so it was best to finish it now.

"Man Bakkun, you eat like you were raised by a family of wolves." Hah, if only he were raised by a family of wolves. They'd have much more of a nurturing spirit than his hag of a mother. He wished she were around so he could tell that to her face.

"Because my meal earlier got interrupted!" Seriously, this guy was getting on his nerves. It was starting to feel like his face was going to stay in a constant scowl so long as Naruto was around.

"We had to hurry, Bakkun! We were running late!"

"We were late because you weren't at the station!"

"Now now, it is not the time to play the blame game Bakkun!"

"SCREW YOU!" Wow, he was so angry that he didn't even curse properly. Had that ever even happened before? After a few seconds of glaring at Naruto, he noticed that Hokage was just patiently sitting there. He found this kinda interesting because, earlier, Naruto had mentioned they should not bring it up so that he wouldn't get in trouble. In his mind, this behavior from the hero pretty much confirmed one thing to him: Naruto was enough of a screw-up that Hokage was not even surprised by it. But then why was the guy around in the first place? There had to be some kind of reason but clearly from their earlier conversation nobody was going to say. Thankfully the idiot was quiet while he finished his meal.

"Please change into your outfit; Naruto shall guide you to me when you're ready."

Hokage stood and walked outside without saying another word. Bakugo looked at Naruto and only saw that same stupid, eyes-closed grin the guy seemed to have quite often but he couldn't even guess the reason why. Did that guy really think a ten percent knockoff would ever have a chance against him? It wasn't even going to be a fight. He grabbed his stuff and walked into another room to change; moments later he came out and started walking toward where Hokage had disappeared to. Naruto jumped up and ran to take the lead.

They walked for a few minutes in silence, surprising given how much the moron seemed to talk, but it was definitely welcome. Bakugo did not know much at all about Hokage's capabilities as a fighter but it was more than obvious that the guy knew about him from the Festival. He should expect some kind of trick in the fight but Hokage himself said earlier that he did not expect the clone to win. So what, exactly, was the catch? Or maybe the hero had some kind of unknowable reason for going with this style?

Damn, he was thinking too much; that was so unlike him when it came to fighting. It felt like something that damn nerd Deku would do. There was nothing to think about really, especially with so many things unaccounted for. The fight would start, he would see Hokage's abilities, and he would adapt to them. Then he would win. It was a simple process, nothing more to it. As soon as he knew what his opponent could do he couldn't lose.

At this point he noticed Hokage ahead of him. They had reached a large clearing among the trees. Unceremoniously an exact copy of the hero appeared before the real one jumped away into the trees; interestingly, that gave him a look into another ability of the hero. No normal person could have ever made that jump; that meant Hokage's 'chakra' had to have some sort of impact on his movement capability. He noted earlier that Hokage must have been ridiculously fast in getting to the area where Bakugo had fought the villain so seeing this was not surprising but was instead an important confirmation.

"Alright, here are the rules. These shall apply not only this fight but all your future fights under our supervision." Again, implying that he was going to defeat the ten percent clone. He never doubted himself in a fight but it seemed that Hokage was either very realistic about the odds or setting up some kind of trap. Still, with a fight about to start, he couldn't help but start to feel that pre-fight focus that put all his senses on edge. It felt good, really good. "The goal of the fight is simple: you will win if I am dispelled and I will win if you are incapable of continuing. You can call for a one-minute pause at anytime. We are both allowed to leave the clearing and go anywhere; however, hiding will not accomplish our goals. If, after one-hour, the goal has not been reached, the fight shall end in a draw. If you are knocked-down, I will not continue my attack, but if you stay down for ten seconds, you lose. Is everything clear?"

It didn't really make any sense that there was even a victory condition for the Hokage clone; after all, he was here for training so why would the clone care about winning? Maybe it was just there to encourage the clone to attack, or to make himself fight more defensively. Yeah, that was probably the reason why; at least it made the most sense.

"Begin!" The clone simply stood there in the field, opposite himself. Bakugo watched for a second, trying to discern if there was any more information he could get.

"Alright, let's do this!" He took a quick step forward, ready to close the distance. In that instant, Hokage also made the motion for a step forward. And in the next, somehow, Bakugo had already lost sight of the guy. And then he heard a voice beside him.

"Fair warning, Bakugo-san. I enjoy winning."

* * *

"You know, I suppose I knew going into the little adventure that Hokage was going to ruin the fun but I wasn't expecting Bakugo-kun to manage it so easily too. That kid is such a troublemaker." The playful voice echoed in the dark room.

"Hmmm, why do you sound so surprised? **He's not surprised; I would say he's almost glad**."

"Glad? No no, not quite right. It really does frustrate me so that even the modern version of our little project cannot win in a fight on equal footing. Oooh, but! But but but! In hand-to-hand combat it was clear that we held the upper hand in terms of speed so clearly that much has been working as planned."

"**But Bakugo still killed it**. Easily too, you just said."

"Yeah yeah, that kid has his super awesome explosive quirk that obviously gives him an advantage but I'd say his little fireworks display at the end of the fight hurt him more than his combatant did."

"Sounds reckless. **More like stupid**."

"Oh, it was; it definitely was. But, that's what I like most about a hero. How much they'll endanger themselves to win!" The man let out a loud, dreamy sigh. "You just don't see that in the villain community. It's all 'oh, I must live to fight another day' and 'die for me, my henchmen!' But I suppose that's why they call it a heroic last stand and not a villainous last stand."

"I can't help but feel this conversation is ironic **because it's coming from the biggest coward we've ever seen.**"

"Hmph, how rude. I am not a coward; I just enjoy the art of a tactical withdrawal!" There was a long moment of silence in the room, before he resumed talking. And this time, his voice had dropped all hints of playfulness. "Inform the others of the outcome; progress has been temporarily set back."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> beta read by: the road I know
> 
> First let me explain a few things: Chakra is a quirk that pops up randomly; Kekkai Genkai are generally planned to just be quirks. Some people may learn to use chakra on their own but wouldn't know to call it that. The history of it will be explained more later on but it doesn't really all belong in this chapter. My goal is to make everything fit as seamlessly as possible into the MHA world so the more explanation I would need to include something the less likely it will be included. Obviously the scientific explanation of the quirk is just pseudoscience to fit the MHA theme.
> 
> As always, thank you for reading. Feel free to kudos/comment/bookmark/etc.


	4. Ten Percent?

The first hit was a fist to his side, making solid contact with his rib cage and knocking the breath out of him. A split second later, he turned his right hand toward his opponent and attempted to land an explosion into the clone's gut. But even acting as quickly as he could, as the familiar sound hit his ears, he received an elbow to the back that forced his body forward. He used the momentum to drop to the ground and did a leg sweep, planning to force the Hokage clone into the air where he would then blow it away. But before his hands were even up, he received a roundhouse kick to the face that spun him around.

He grit his teeth as he attempted to stand up; but he hadn't caught his breath and his head really fucking hurt.

"Damn it!" He had just absolutely gotten his ass handed to him in about ten seconds by a clone that wasn't even half as strong as the real deal; how the hell had that happened!

"One. Two." The monotonous voice counted, slowly. What was the rule again? Ten seconds to get up if he got knocked to the ground? He got back to his feet after hearing three, and focused more intently on his opponent than he had before. Obviously, their first engagement could not have gone any worse; it was a total disgrace and he wanted to kill something, but he already learned a few things.

First, his opponent was fast. He already knew that, but there was a huge difference between being fast while running in a forest and being fast in an actual fight. He knew now that he would definitely need to use his quirk to enhance his speed and go all-out in terms of mobility, but as long as he could do that he definitely had an easy win coming his way. A smile formed on his face; yep, he was still in control of this fight. Like he had thought earlier, as soon as he knew his opponent's quirk, there was no way he could lose. Unfortunately, Hokage's other strength was that his hits felt like they were coming from a damn baseball bat, but all he had to do was avoid those.

"Alright, hope you're ready to die!" He put his hands behind his back and used them to launch himself at the clone, knowing he had figured out how to win this fight. Rearing his right-hand back, he kept a close eye on his opponent for any hint of the direction he would try to dodge. But there was no tell, which meant it was going to face the attack head on.

Bakugo threw his right hook, and Hokage barely moved, dodging his head backward before using both hands to grab Bakugo's right arm. "Wrong move pal!" Bakugo shouted, but when he brought his left hand forward to unleash an explosion, Hokage spun him around and propelled him several feet through the air before he could even get off an attack. He had been expecting the guy to go for a knee to his exposed stomach; that would have ended it for sure because there was no way the clone could have dodged while doing that. But he supposed this was an improvement over last time and a sign that he had taken the advantage.

Before he touched the ground, he found his orientation mid-air –intensively practicing his aerial combat had definitely paid off– and blasted toward his opponent with the intention of wiping him off the face of the planet. Thrusting his hands forward, he released an explosion straight at the clone.

If there was anything he had been expecting, it was not for Hokage to charge at him in that situation. After all, he himself was the one on the offensive and in control, not that damn clone! Almost anybody in that situation would have tried dodging to the left, right, or backwards, it was common sense, and yet this clone had the balls to quickly rush forward and dodge under his hands, evading the attack completely. Before Bakugo could turn the situation around, a fist was in his stomach, and its momentum delivered a devastating blow.

The clone jumped away as Bakugo doubled over, cursing himself; if he hadn't lost focus he could have hooked his hands over the clone's shoulders and destroyed him with one well-placed explosion. He had to be able to take advantage of this; there was no way one little punch should rattle him! If there was a one-second window of opportunity, then he would always blow that damn window straight to hell. But instead, Bakugo found himself on the ground, panting, his arms and torso already bruised and battered.

"I...will… kill you..." he huffed out, and got to his feet as quickly as he could, which was admittedly a little slow.

"Timeout!" He heard a too familiar annoying voice say; honestly, he had forgot all about that damn blond during the fight. And why was the guy calling a timeout for him, it's not like they were on teams or anything! "You're really getting a beat-down out here Bakkun!" That smile was on Naruto's face again. The eyes closed, wide smile that really truly irritated him to his core and made him want to nuke the idiot.

"Shut the hell up and don't ever get in my way."

"Don't be dumb Bakkun; I just wanted to give you some advice." The guy then seriously crossed his arms and turned away, like he was pouting. If Bakugo hadn't been focused on taking out Hokage, which was definitely going to be a lot more entertaining than fighting some neanderthal degenerate who got lost and couldn't find his way back to the cave, then he really would've killed the guy here and now. In fact, even with all that, the temptation to raise his arm and blow him away was hard to resist.

"Why exactly do you think I need your help? And stop calling me that, damn it!"

"Hehe, you're so stubborn Bakkun! Well, I guess I'll leave you to getting kicked around; it's pretty fun to watch." He laughed and jumped away, and Bakugo felt a headache coming on; honestly, as if he needed any help from a brain-dead degenerate. Although, now that he thought about it, if Naruto could jump away like that, it pretty much fully confirmed that Naruto's quirk was also that 'chakra' thing. He'd store that information for when he destroyed the idiot.

Turning back to his current fight, he was pretty pissed he hadn't managed to win it yet. He thought about using his gauntlets but that probably wouldn't work since the guy had already shown himself to be fast enough to dodge Bakugo's move if there was distance between them. But if they were close, it also seemed unlikely he would be able to pull the pin without Hokage being able to stop it or get away from it. Unless, of course, the guy was distracted by something else. Bakugo growled; the best plan was still to use his maneuverability to land a solid hit. But then, he thought with a smirk, there was no reason he couldn't do both.

"Time in." He launched himself forward using his explosions, this time a little quicker than before. There was a slight crackle in his left arm from the exertion but he would just have to deal with it until he won. This time, when he thrust his hand forward, instead of throwing a right hook, he aimed an explosion straight at his opponent.

"Die!" But instead of a massive explosion, he created a small one just in front of his opponent, who dodged to the side. Bakugo smiled at that because it was exactly what he had wanted; still in mid-air, he aimed his gauntlet at the clone and quickly pulled the pin. The explosion that followed was enormous and deafening but he was sure it had hit the target At least, until he saw a blur of movement to his left and realized the guy had somehow managed to dodge it. Based on everything Bakugo had seen from the guy, that should have been impossible. Apparently, the freak could move even faster.

Hokage then rushed at him and threw a quick punch; Bakugo should have blocked it cleanly but his damn arms felt so heavy and the strike opened up his guard. It didn't take a genius to know that this exchange was going to end badly. And that's when he saw Hokage's right leg lift off the ground. He didn't even have time to properly react before it connected.

* * *

"You take a student under your wing and you knock him out on day one? And then you think you can just interrupt me while I'm on an important business trip to take care of him?"

The woman's voice above him was authoritative, and practically shouting, and it took a few moments for Bakugo to process things. Knocked out? He realized he was lying on his back and suddenly remembered the fight with Hokage. Had that final kick managed to put him out cold? Damn, he had gotten his ass kicked! Damn!

"Damn it!"

"Oh look, I see you're awake. Listen you little brat, try not to move too much. I didn't get dragged all the way out here just to have my hard work put to waste."

Bakugo took a look at the woman leaning over him; she looked older but didn't have wrinkles and her blond hair was tied into pigtails. She also had some kind of weird green jewel on her forehead. "And who the hell are you supposed to be?"

She had the nerve to ignore him. "Why are you teaching this kid how to fight? It's clear to me he needs to learn some manners!" He glared at her, and when she returned it with her own glare, he had to admit that it was pretty intense. Craning his neck, he saw that Hokage and Naruto were both in the room as well.

"Bakugo-san, this is Lady Tsunade; she is a very talented healer who I brought in to make sure you could resume training today."

Naruto snickered to himself. "Lady Tsunade? Hah, more like Granny Tsunade!"

"Don't call me that!" The woman yelled and punched the floor, and to Bakugo's surprise, it actually left several knuckle imprints in the wood. Apparently the idiot blond's nicknames annoyed other people too. A healer that could do that much damage with only a light punch was not exactly normal; he couldn't think of any way that Recovery Girl at UA would hold up in a fight, but this woman looked like she could.

Ignoring that, he focused on his own body. His head hurt like hell, probably due to the knock-out kick in the face he'd taken like a pansy, and both of his arms were definitely sore, though they had definitely been worse in the past. If he had only fought the Hokage clone, he doubted they would be hurting like this; it was using an unfinished move against that villain copy of himself earlier in the day that had probably done it.

"I can't believe you dragged me out of important business for this" she went on, clearly irritated.

"Oh, boo hoo, Granny had to leave the slot machines for once in her life to help someone out! Oh the horror!" The way Pigtail scowled made Bakugo think she was going to leave knuckle imprints in the moron's skull but after a second she just sighed.

"Should have known as soon as I hit the ten-to-one payout that I was going to have my day interrupted."

Hokage interrupted both of them, something Bakugo had to admit he was thankful for. "Will his injuries be healed enough to resume training today?"

He started to sit up, ignoring the aches in his upper body. "Yeah, I'm good to go," Bakugo growled. The muscles in his wrists and shoulders were pretty tight but nothing he couldn't push through easily and it didn't really matter if his ribs were sore; it's not like he was punching anyone with his rib cage. Realistically he had every advantage over his opponent going into the next fight, and just thinking about how he'd gotten knocked out made him scowl and itching for another go. No way was it happening again, that much was for damn sure.

"He's fine." Tsunade confirmed with an amused sneer. "Even without my healing he would have been in fighting shape by tomorrow evening at the latest. Definitely an unnecessary trip."

"Can it Granny! That's a whole day away and he needs as much training as he can get! He couldn't even land a single hit out there!"

"Shut the hell up you blond idiot," Bakugo snapped before Tsunade could respond. But if tomorrow afternoon was a 'whole day away', and the fight had been in the evening, that meant he'd been out cold at least through the night and now into the morning. Damn, he literally got kicked to sleep, what an embarrassment.

"Two hours with a decent breakfast and he should be almost as good as new. Honestly though, I shouldn't have done any of this after what this brat did to me."

"The fuck have I ever done to you woman?" Bakugo had never seen Pigtail once in his life before now, as far as he knew. Then again, that really didn't mean much because he really didn't care about all the random people who introduced themselves to him. If his entire middle school class came in right now he wouldn't know a single one of their names and he wouldn't care even a little bit that he didn't. Hell, if his entire class at school right now did, it wouldn't go much better.

"You cost me a lot of money at the Sports Festival. Endeavor's kid had 3 to 1 odds and I had my money on him. But then you decide to go and spoil things for me by beating him in the finals. Even worse, I made another bet with an old friend and turns out you came up big for him."

"Stupid bet, not my fault you're a sucker." Honestly, like he cared about some lady's gambling problems. But based on how many times she'd mentioned gambling, he was willing to bet she was up to her pigtails in debt.

"Thank you for healing him; if you don't mind, I need to talk to you about something else. Then you can go back to your business." The two of them left the room, leaving him alone with the nuisance. He already knew this was going to be annoying.

"How are you doing today, Bakkun?"

"Stop talking."

"Sheesh, so rude! Anyway Bakkun, I was thinking about your fight. And you know what? I gotta admit, you did pretty good for your first time. I thought for sure the speed would be too much for you but that quirk can be used in some pretty awesome ways."

"I don't need your analysis."

"Of course you do Bakkun, because at the end of the day, you lost! To a clone at just ten percent too!" The guy kinda chuckled a bit and Bakugo really, really wanted to blow the blond straight to hell, but he figured it would not be looked upon kindly if he destroyed Hokage's house. Probably wouldn't get a rematch, after all. A scowl formed on Bakugo's face at the idea that he had lost, especially to a clone that was only ten percent of the original. "Oh, I get it, you're really bothered by the ten percent thing huh? Guess that means you haven't figured it out yet."

"The hell are you talking about?"

"Come on Bakkun, use your head. Aren't you supposed to be a genius or something?"

"Whatever; doubt it matters anyway." Honestly he didn't need any advice and he damn sure was not about to be led on by some moron.

"I guess since you don't have chakra, you don't really get it. The clone you were fighting had ten percent of the chakra that Hokage himself has; but that doesn't mean what you think it means."

"If you're gonna keep talking anyway, at least make some sense."

"Well, it might be a little weird to explain because I mostly just learned through experience. I guess it's kinda like a lake or something. If you can only use ten percent of the lake water, and just pretend that anything you do on the lake uses up the water," the guy was probably hurting himself trying to figure out how to use a metaphor, "if there's no option at all once you use up that percent, then you're going to be careful in using it. If something uses a lot of water, like filling a swimming pool, you're not going to do it. You're going to use less for bathing and focus more on the essentials, like drinking. Even then, you're gonna to be careful with that. Oh man, I am nailing this! I need to write this down."

Holy shit, the guy had actually had a moment of not being a total idiot and then proceeded to blow it up better than Bakugo himself could have done with a literal explosion. "Basically, the clone was rationing since the fight could have lasted an hour at max, and that's why he wasn't using any weird techniques. Only using it for hand-to-hand."

"Exactly, Bakkun! You catch on quick, you know that? Of course, moving at the pace the clone was comes completely natural alongside training and uses almost no chakra really. Jumping takes a little but a guy like the great Hokage replaces it faster than that uses it, but clones don't generate chakra so it had to keep these things in mind. So when it got in a bad situation, it had plenty left to use to bail itself out."

"And that's why he seemed faster after I used my gauntlet. Damn, I KNEW I almost had him!" Bakugo knew there was something wrong with the way Hokage had mentioned the ten percent strength and now he finally figured out what it was. It didn't necessarily mean he had one-tenth the speed or one-tenth the hit power that the real Hokage had, it just meant the clone had less ability to use that chakra stuff to enhance itself or attack. But, when he thought he had the fight won, it had enough to use a boost to escape his attack.

"After watching that fight, I gotta say, you've got some crazy good fighting instinct Bakkun. I know you're gonna be all mad because you lost, I would be too, but the clone really was not holding back more than it needed to make sure it could last the whole time. Even without all the fancy stuff, Hokage's basic fighting style is hard for most quirks to keep up with in a fair fight. Of course, with his job, he doesn't get many fair fights, but still."

Of course most people couldn't deal with it. Even the clone using the basics had very high mobility, high strength, and a very high reaction time. At this level, the quirk and reaction time didn't really matter together but it was easy to imagine that with more abilities in-play they would. Unfortunately, he didn't even know the basics about what those abilities could be besides the 'shadow clones'; damn, oh well, he was just going to have to find a way to win anyway. If he could just get a little more creative in making explosions that should be enough.

"Most quirks are useless." For every one that was like his, there was one that was a gimmick. Something like a stomach laser or resistance to heat or other shit that wouldn't get anyone even sniffing the top of the hero rankings. Power and Versatility were all that mattered.

"Well, that's a little harsh Bakkun. Gotta play the hand you're dealt, as they say." Yeah, unless you didn't and you got to cheat the cards after the fact, Bakugo thought. "Your problem though is that Hokage has instinct and experience; he is a pro hero after all, and you're just some grumpy little student." It was strange the way this guy only seemed to talk about fighting relative to Hokage and hadn't mentioned his own capabilities even once. "Thinking about it, there are really only two other people in your class who could have hoped to compete in that fight. Endeavor's kid would have it pretty rough because his moves are so predictable. One hand forward, ice goes forward. Other hand forward, fire goes forward. But maybe he could pull something off. Really it'd be between you and that Midoriya kid."

"Do NOT compare me to that worthless Deku!"

"Oh man, touched a nerve there huh Bakkun? He didn't seem all that bad. What's he ever done to you?"

"It doesn't matter. That damn Deku… quirkless all his life until he gets into UA..." he trailed off, scowling as he thought of the damn nerd. From the time they were kids, Deku always, ALWAYS, thought that Bakugo was inferior, like he needed protection and rescuing. He could see it clearly in his head, that time he barely fell into a creek and the way the loser extended his hand to help him up, a look in his eye like he was worried. Always playing the part of the hero, no matter how stupid it was. Like that time Bakugo got jumped by that sludge villain, and none of the pro heroes were doing anything, but damn Deku comes running in like he can do anything about it. Deku had always thought he was a real hero, even before he could back it up.

"D-did you say Midoriya was quirkless before high school? Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure!" There was a serious look on Naruto's face, for the first time Bakugo could remember since he'd met the blond idiot.

But just then, Hokage calmly walked back into the room. "I apologize; taking Tsunade back took a bit longer than expected. She wouldn't let me leave until I won once at the slot machine." What? How in the hell did Hokage get Pigtail anywhere she could gamble, actually gambled himself, and already gotten back? Could he use chakra to pull off something like a spatial quirk?

"How much did you win?" A stupid grin and starry eyes had replaced the moron's serious look of a moment before. Bakugo was not surprised at all that it was a fleeting expression.

"Not much; she took most of it of course. Said she needed to buy something for Shizune. Anyway, I'll get started on breakfast. Bakugo-san, you're free to wander around the house if you like but don't stress yourself for now. You'll have your rematch later. As for you, Naruto, you shall attend to your duties. It should be at least a half hour."

"Aww, but that's boring! I wanna hang out more with Bakkun!" But Hokage left the room without a response and, a few seconds later, Naruto did as well, though with a scowl on his face.

Bakugo wondered what that was all about but decided he didn't really care.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> beta read by: the road I know
> 
> Hope you enjoyed the fight scene and don't mind too much that our poor little Bakkun got knocked out cold. Tough matchup but I think he did well. 
> 
> As always, thank you for reading. Please feel free to comment/kudos/bookmark/anything.


	5. Mysteries in Konoha and A Rematch

Things were quiet for the moment, with Hokage outside somewhere and Naruto returning to his so-called 'duties' after breakfast, leaving Bakugo alone. Breakfast had been a short affair, consisting of a cobbled together mess of meat, grains, and vegetables; overall it was decent but Bakugo knew he could have made something better. Preferably with a lot more spice.

He had not been given anything to do but he was feeling close to 100% following the meal, so changed back into his hero costume and decided to do a light workout while he waited. The room was small but open so he had plenty of space to just do some push-ups and sit-ups.

As he started the workout, he considered his situation. Everyone in his class was doing 'hero internships' at the moment; what were the chances that anyone else was going to get as much real training as he was? He didn't know or really care where anyone else went off to but it was definitely more probable they were patrolling for purse-snatchers and learning how to do paperwork than sparring against someone who should be considered a Top 5 hero, at least according to that damn Deku. A scowl formed as his body unconsciously continued the tedious exercise. That nerd was probably getting special training from All-Might himself to try to find some way to not break every bone in his body in every fight.

Bakugo unconsciously increased the pace of his workout. Just the thought of that damn nerd pissed him off.

It seemed unlikely that most of his classmates besides… Deku… would be improving much in combat during this little week, which really was not much of a surprise considering everyone else's total lack of a spine. Maybe Icy-Hot would be training too; Endeavor probably didn't have to worry too much about the boring parts of the job. Number two hero would probably have people to take care of that shit. Of course it would be his main competition… damn, no, hell no, he was not about to start thinking like that. He was going to stay ahead of those idiots no matter what. As if some damn nerd and a loser with daddy issues were going to be able to outdo him.

"Wow Bakkun, you even scowl when you're doing sit-ups? That's something else!"

Well there went the peace and quiet.

"Don't you have something else to do, moron?"

The bright blond just smiled widely, a look of mischief in his eyes. "Yeah… hehe." The idiot rubbed the back of his neck. "But that's boring!"

Bakugo simply continued to do the simple exercise, ignoring the nuisance's presence. As usual, it was ineffective at keeping the guy quiet.

"Aren't you going to ask me what my duties are? Oh man, they're so boring Bakkun!"

"Why in the hell do you think I'd care!?"

"Such a jerk Bakkun. Ya know, I used to think that I had good taste in friends. But you're a real downer."

"We are not friends!" Bakugo had already pretty much confirmed that the idiot's quirk was Chakra, but it was becoming clear that the moron had two quirks: Chakra and one that caused migraines to any unfortunate enough to be in his presence. Maybe it was written down in the government's files as 'Rampant Stupidity.'

"Of course we are; only friends have sleepovers, right?"

Bakugo paused, staring momentarily, contemplating if it were possible for someone to be so dumb. He was met by the sound of raucous laughter, groaning as he continued the sit-ups. "Oh man, Bakkun, that reaction was hilarious. I was just messing around. Why do you have to be so uptight anyway?"

"Why are you so stupid!" he growled back, on instinct.

"Honestly, if you got to know me Bakkun, I think you might change your mind!"

"Not a damn chance."

"Tell you what... I'll tell you my super secret duties. Are you ready? After breakfast, I had to go outside. You know what I did?"

Bakugo was somewhat confused, not expecting to actually be told what the hell the moron was up to.

Naruto continued. "I tended the garden!"

"I don't care!" He did note, however, a total lack of dirt on the moron.

"Haha, you should've seen your face Bakkun! You were expecting something interesting but I was just doing some work with plants. Ya know, I used to have my own little plant way back when. His name was Mr. Ukki. Or, well, its name I guess huh?"

"How about you get back to gardening?"

"Well, I never get any company so I'd rather hang out with you honestly."

"I am NOT your company, you stupid bastard." He was here to have fights with a guy who was obviously one of the strongest heroes, based on what Bakugo had seen thus far. If he were here to be an idiot's company, he'd have blown some shit up and flew the hell away by now.

"Okay fine, sheesh, I don't know why you're so grouchy, Bakkun. But I bet I know something that could lift your mood. Let's get out of this stuffy place."

"Hell no! I'm warming up here until it's time for my rematch!"

"Trust me Bakkun!" Before Bakugo even had time to tell the guy off, the older blond had grabbed him by the arm and pulled him to his feet and out the door in a matter of seconds. Bakugo was actually surprised by this. The first time they met, the guy had pulled him out of his seat and down the street but this time it was a little different: he had resisted, at least slightly. There hadn't been any real indications before but Naruto must be at least physically strong; the grip on his forearm was not even tight and yet he had been dragged so easily.

Regardless, he batted away the arm with a scowl on his face; surprisingly, the idiot actually let go. Bakugo found himself following the guy through the forest anyway; why the hell he didn't just turn around he didn't even know.

"Do you even know where you're going?"

"Be quiet Bakkun. We have to be stealthy, like ninja!"

Bakugo rolled his eyes. It seemed out of the question that the loud idiot could ever be quiet like a damn ninja. Somewhat to his surprise, however, Naruto did stay silent as they continued moving through the woods, setting a fast pace while effortlessly avoiding trees, limbs, and roots.

Bakugo was surprised by the ease of Naruto's movements but was too busy trying to keep up without using explosions to make anything of them. This was so stupid; why the hell was he following some moron into the forest? It wouldn't even surprise him if the idiot got lost, damn it!

Suddenly Naruto stopped, kneeling behind a bush and peering over it at something.

It was slightly annoying to follow the idiot's lead even further but the guy did at least seem somewhat serious for a change so perhaps that explained Bakugo's willingness to go along for now. Crouching, he approached and heard for the first time the clanging of metal from somewhere past the line of bushes.

He looked over and saw now that there were two Hokages standing in a rather small clearing, staring at each other with something in their hands. He remembered now: those were kunai. Old farmers' tools and occasional ninja weapons. They both had one in each hand. The moron had tried to murder Masked Man with it.

"Why did you drag me here?" Bakugo asked, not knowing what he had expected but still somewhat disappointed. He could have been preparing himself for his next match instead of being here. But no, some idiots obviously didn't appreciate things like training. He wished he knew why the hell there was some kind of universal conspiracy among morons to waste his time.

"So you could watch, duh. The more information you have, the better you'll handle fights Bakkun."

Bakugo scoffed at that idea. "I'm not one of those stupid groupies, stalking heroes just so..."

"Here it goes, watch!"

Seething at being interrupted, he noticed no indications in the Hokages that anything had changed. And then, abruptly, one of them gave a slight flick of the wrist and sent the weapon flying at an insane speed toward his opponent. Then the other responded with a quick movement of his own, and in the next second metal clanged as the two kunai struck in midair and dropped to the ground.

Had the second kunai actually hit the first in the air, at that speed? The answer was obviously yes. The action repeated, with the second kunai again managing to hit the first even as it went in a different direction at a different speed and a different height. The weapon did not even manage to get very far. What the hell kind of reflexes...

"Like what you see?" There was that broad, cheeky grin that made Bakugo's skin crawl with a desire to blow it up.

"Just some stupid training routine."

"Tell me something: which one is the original?"

Bakugo rolled his eyes. "I am not that damn nerd; I don't care about analyzing their quirks or any of that stupid shit. The only thing that matters to me is my training and my quirk."

Naruto looked straight at him; it was a fierce, piercing gaze and the slightest hint of a scowl adorned the guy's features. Those blue eyes had lost all trace of that idiotic air and seemed to contain a confident strength that somehow looked both foreign and natural. It caught Bakugo by surprise.

"Quit lying to me, Bakkun."

What the hell? Where had that come from all of a sudden? He was blindsided by that sudden change of expression on Naruto's face and caught further off guard by the serious, somewhat demanding tone of voice. Was the consistently moronic Naruto an act? Or was this Naruto an act? What the hell was going on?

"Which one is the real Hokage?" The repeat question brought Bakugo back to his senses, and he scowled as he contemplated answering it.

"That one," Bakugo said, reluctantly, pointing to the Hokage closest to them. It only made sense that that was the real Hokage because he'd been the second one to throw the kunai. Clearly Hokage was training his reflexes by having a clone throw kunai randomly while the hero attempted to hit them swiftly out of the air.

"Now was that so hard?" Naruto's voice was back to that happy-go-lucky carefree tone. "Don't be such a grump okay Bakkun? I hate having to be so serious."

He didn't know what, but there was definitely something going on here in Konoha. He realized, for all of the idiot's ceaseless chatter, the guy was a mystery. Last name, birthplace, name of high school? Hadn't mentioned it. Names of those annoying friends? Nope, except Lee, which was hardly much of an identifier. He didn't even know what Naruto was doing with Hokage, although if he had to guess, it was some kind of training. But there was clearly a confident strength somewhere under his idiocy, so maybe the guy was a sidekick? Although Deku hadn't mentioned Hokage having a sidekick, Hokage did mention Naruto having duties so maybe those kept the blond busy? They both seemed to use that chakra stuff, so that much made sense.

But then what was the real reason Bakugo was here? It's not like he had chakra or anything. Had Hokage ever really given a reason?

'_But, unless something changes, it is a simple fact that you will not have time to fully develop before you face villains again.'_

He supposed that was a reason, albeit one without any damn explanation behind it. Like, how Hokage could be so certain of it when UA was upping security. Thinking on it, a more underground hero, who kept so many secrets, and did not do public patrol or make his base of operations known, would need to have a pretty good intel network to actually be effective. But why attack UA or UA students again?

'_D-did you say that Midoriya was quirkless before high school? Are you sure?'_

And why the hell did that come to his mind?

"Oh, watch this Bakkun!"

Bakugo broke out of his trance. Fuck, he was thinking too much again. He shouldn't even be allowing himself to think about this shit; after all, he was not going to even be around this place after the interning week was over.

But he couldn't ignore it anymore. Especially not when Naruto had seemingly thrown down a challenge to figure it out. Unfortunately, by letting himself finally think about all the mysteries around him, he had gone along with the idiot's advice. There was no way was he going to let the moron in on it though, especially not before he figured out what the hell was actually going on with that guy. Bakugo wondered if Hokage was complicit in Naruto's challenge. There was no way of knowing, although there _did_ seem to be some disagreement between the two.

The clone suddenly dissolved, and Hokage threw his hands up in front of his body before ten more clones appeared all around him. Without a single audible word the ten copies spread into a uniform circle surrounding their creator, simply standing there for a second before commencing a simultaneous attack.

Bakugo kept his eyes focused on the real Hokage, watching as the man jumped above a leg sweep while blocking a punch with each hand. The masked hero landed a split-second later, before immediately jumping to the left and dodging an attack from behind. The small horde of clones were relentless, resuming the attack immediately from every angle.

It was obvious that Hokage retained an advantage in speed over the clones. Still, the constant attacks forced him on the defensive. Bakugo averted his attention to the clones. They did not seem to be much less capable than their creator so they should have been able to land a hit, especially with their numbers.

As they continued, he started to notice that they were disjointed, and displayed minimal amounts of teamwork. Before he could process that further, Hokage caught one clone's arm and threw it harshly against another, both disappearing in a cloud of smoke.

In that moment of surprise, the original struck out. After being on the defensive the entire time, Hokage began lashing out with punches and kicks that forced the attackers to back off. The clones separated into smaller groups as they dodged, and Hokage launched himself at the group furthest away.

Suddenly the man's speed went from 'fast' to 'holy shit' and Bakugo felt certain this must be the guy's full speed. Hokage rushed between groups, dispatching overwhelmed clones like they were nothing. It was like watching All-Might fight purse snatchers.

Bakugo may not have known that much about shadow clones, but he felt certain they would be fully familiar with the hero's fighting style. Was there that much of a difference between the clones and the real deal? Gritting his teeth, he realized fighting the real Hokage would require him to pull out every trick he had. The guy's speed and close combat were very good, and Bakugo still had little idea about more chakra abilities.

With only one clone left, Hokage seized the advantage quickly and slipped under a punch to get behind his last remaining opponent. The hero reared his right arm back and without warning a blue spinning orb appeared in his hand. The second it made contact with the clone's back, the clone burst into smoke while the orb exploded in a blinding flare of blue.

Just like that the fight was over. Bakugo looked over at Naruto, but the moron's face was a blank-slate even after that showcase.

Moments later, he heard a voice from behind him. "I always do better with an audience."

Bakugo turned and came face-to-mask with Hokage. A quick look back toward the field revealed no sign of the hero there. How did the guy get here so fast? Bakugo hadn't even heard any movement so how the hell?

"I'm glad that you're so eager, Bakugo-san," Hokage continued. "Somehow I figured you would not take much time resting."

"Of course not. Damn clone got one lucky shot in and that's it. I'm gonna kill the thing this time." Disgust rose in him as he thought back to that final kick he received. There was absolutely no way that was going to happen again.

"That final technique, the blue orb? It's called the Rasengan. I know a clone impact doesn't do it justice but that technique has taken down many villains." The man's voice deviated ever so slightly from its usual evenness, becoming a little bit upbeat. Bakugo felt pretty sure the guy was having some kind of flashback to all those mentioned fights.

"Won't making all those clones drain your chakra?" Bakugo didn't want to get robbed of a proper fight and it only seemed logical that using techniques like that and the... Rasengan... could deplete a limited supply.

The idiot chimed in. "It would take a lot more than that for Hokage to even dip into his reserve, believe it!"

"Naruto's correct," Hokage said, tone once again even. "I need to be ready to respond immediately in an emergency so I do lighter training throughout the day, with a short period of heavy training around dusk. The strongest villains tend to strike in the day-time since they'll want to be seen and probably have an agenda to spread. Or if they're covert it's so late in the night that I've already recovered."

Seemingly trusting; telling him something that seemed important but with no hint of the most critical part: how Hokage was informed of such emergencies. Bakugo didn't know why it bothered him, considering it made perfect sense. But it'd be stupid to worry about that kind of nonsense right now when there was a fight looming that he was absolutely going to win.

"Whatever. Just let me blow this damn clone straight to Hell!" At this point, that familiar desire for a fight was taking over, pushing everything else to the background where it belonged.

"Very well. I suppose you should be fully recovered." Without any further waiting, Hokage created another shadow clone. Bakugo couldn't stop himself from eyeing his opponent with a scowl on his face. The sting of his defeat, capped off with an embarrassing knockout, was fresh and now that his opponent was here his eagerness to destroy the creation only increased. "This clearing should do fine, if you're both ready to start."

Bakugo nodded his head as the clone did the same. He walked into the edge of the clearing as the clone jumped to the other side. He quickly flicked his neck left then right, popping it, while cracking his knuckles. Crouching into a sprinter's stance, right knee down with his left leg outstretched behind him, his hands dug into the ground on either side. Briefly, a thought occurred to Bakugo. He felt damn good.

"Begin."

Explosions ripped through the air as Bakugo launched himself toward the clone, grinning ear-to-ear with the anticipation of destroying his opponent. He led with a right hook, which the clone dodged easily by leaning back. The clone followed with a motion for a left-handed uppercut, but Bakugo opened his right palm outward, an explosion immediately forming.

The clone quickly dodged left, but having anticipated that, the momentum from the explosion spun Bakugo around and he extended a leg to land a kick. The clone ducked under it but Bakugo launched another explosion from his hands where his opponent was still crouched. It jumped back, narrowly avoiding the attack, as Bakugo himself was launched backwards from the force. He landed a few feet away, grinning. His victory was imminent, he could feel it.

"A much more impressive opening this time, Bakugo-san," the clone said, surprising him. The last one had only talked during the knock-down countdown. "I think I'll have some fun. This is exciting." The clone's voice was fully upbeat, making it sound very different than Hokage's normal one. And yet, oddly familiar.

Suddenly, it launched itself at Bakugo, who had only a second to dodge to the side. He briefly wondered how the thing was suddenly faster but couldn't let that distract him. He immediately exploded the area where the Hokage clone landed but it had barely touched the ground before jumping backward before the explosion could hit.

Bakugo growled and pursued. He couldn't let it regroup. He was in control of this fight and would finish it before the clone used any tricks. Another forward explosion was dodged but this time the clone jumped right at him afterward.

Remembering how careless these clones could be, Bakugo was ready for the suicidal move. He extended a knee forward but it was blocked by the clone. He threw a left hook but it was dodged with a sudden head movement. At the same instant, he brought his right hand almost to the clone's stomach.

"DIE!" Bakugo felt all contact from the clone cease a split second before a large explosion ripped through the air. He waited out the smoke and dust to see if his attack had connected but that hope died when he saw the clone standing far off to the left of the blast.

"Oh man, that was close," it said, wiping the dust from its outfit. Bakugo knew he had gotten close to ending it twice now, and now his sweat was really starting to pick up. His explosions should be faster than Hokage's reactions. "You know, Bakugo, I don't think this fight will last an hour at this rate."

Bakugo glared at the clone, wondering what kind of game it could be playing. It simply continued talking. "So, I'll give you an ultimatum. Either you beat me in five minutes, or..."

"Or what?" He was angry that his revenge fight was being put on hold for more qualifying conditions.

"Or I'll run out of chakra and you'll win by default."

"The hell kind of ultimatum is that? Either I win or you lose."

"Exactly. Either you win by defeating me... or I lose. And you won't have landed a single hit. I know you wouldn't be satisfied winning like that. I know I wouldn't be."

"Fine; whatever." Bakugo was ready to get the fight back on. At this point, he was sweating quite a bit so he had plenty of material to use.

The clone charged at him, but he did nothing but smile. With a sweep of his hand, a large explosion ripped through the ground directly in front of him, smoke and dust filling the air. Knowing the clone's path, Bakugo jumped directly at it without using an explosion. There was an absolutely vicious smile on his face as he appeared in front of the clone; he wished he could have seen the look on its face but that stupid kitsune mask made it impossible.

"Good riddance!" He threw a right hook while the clone was still mid-air. His fist made contact and sent the clone spinning through the air before bursting into a cloud of smoke.

But before he could contemplate his victory, he felt a fist to his gut. The air surged out of his lungs as he doubled over in shock, still mid-air. Then three feet kicked him simultaneously, launching him into the air. Had the clone made clones? He couldn't orient himself and was helpless when another hard kick made contact with his back and sent him barreling into the ground.

He landed with a bone-jarring thud, but was too fired up to feel pain or defeat. He felt only rage.

With a swell of angry energy, Bakugo hurtled his body from the ground and used a small explosion to get higher in the air. He immediately threw out his right hand, using the explosion from it to get himself spinning. As quickly as he could, he started rotating like a psychotic spinning top, firing off explosions in every direction.

His arms quaked with resistance to the onslaught but Bakugo pushed himself further anyway, forcing more powerful blasts. After he lost the ability to make the explosions any bigger, Bakugo finally stopped and landed on his feet, breathing heavily with his arms sorely aching from the intense attack. He figured it had maybe only been twenty seconds.

He looked around, unable to find an opponent, but he crouched into a fighting stance again anyway, unwilling to get hit by another surprise.

"WOW Bakkun! That was awesome!" He looked to see the too-familiar idiot approaching him and, figuring that not even that moron would interfere in his training fight, allowed himself to let his arms dangle by his side and relax.

"Yes, it was impressive." The real Hokage appeared suddenly beside him. How in the... "While you were worn out during the prior fight, I still think it was clear from what I've seen of all three fights that you have already improved a bit in your stay." Bakugo's eyes narrowed quickly, looking at the hero. Three fights? "You shall rest for six hours and we will do a different, less-intensive exercise in the evening. Around noon tomorrow you will fight a 30% clone."

Looked like he'd done so damn well that he'd skipped right over the 20% clone; that was good. He wanted the chance to face-off against the real Hokage as soon as possible.

Then the idiot spoke up again."Who cares about all that? What do you call that move of yours, anyway?"

Bakugo smirked, red eyes filled with a sudden vibrance that made it clear to all the world what a badass he knew he was. "Crowd Control."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't think there's much to say about this chapter. Some nice progression, a cool fight scene, hopefully some Bakugo moments you'll all think were particularly awesome. 
> 
> As always, thank you for reading. Please feel free to kudos/comment/bookmark if you enjoyed it.


	6. Back to School

Bakugo looked up at the school as he walked along the path leading to the gates. His body was still somewhat sore from all the constant fighting but hardly anything to worry about. Facing off against those clones was actually more beneficial than he would have guessed. Being able to go all-out in a fight was unusual, even with the increased training freedom offered at UA. The most similar experience he'd had were the fights in the Sports Festival, but even then there had been extra rules and so much damn drama.

Konoha, of course, did seem to have its share of drama. But at least that silly drama was constantly in the background and didn't interfere with the fighting. Its persistence had pissed him off to the point where he had gotten curious though. Even then, Hokage and that idiot did not tell him more than they wanted to. In fact, they had told him essentially nothing of any importance after he defeated that first clone. Not that he'd asked; no way he was giving that blond moron the satisfaction of thinking that he cared.

A part of him understood clearly: Naruto _wanted _him to figure it out. But he didn't know why, and not knowing why was what really pissed him off. At least he didn't have to give a damn about that anymore. All those stupid little mysteries had really started to get on his nerves. He wouldn't have put up with it except for the thrill of fighting.

Suddenly, he felt eyes on him. He looked around, casually turning his head, figuring it was probably just the damn Nerd or Spiky Hair. Or maybe the media, since they were always hovering around the school like vultures ready to eat the meat off any skeleton from UA's closet.

Instead, he was greeted with the sight of someone a few feet away, some kind of canvas in his grip. The freak was looking straight at him, and Bakugo's eyes immediately narrowed into a glare of his own. He noticed the guy's clothes immediately and felt a chill. Dark robes with little red clouds. Same ones Masked Man had been wearing.

The seconds dragged as they stared each other down.. The man's blond hair covered his left eye but the look in his right was sinister. Other students made a wide arc around them, a subconscious avoidance of the cold threat in the air.

"Got a problem, Cyclops?" Bakugo's voice came out steady, lazily, yet the promise of danger was very real.

"Hmph, good guess." The man's smile was more a leer as he pulled his hair to the side to show a bulky eyepatch. Bakugo already called bullshit on this; there was definitely something under that eyepatch. "Anyway, I must admit, I've been _dying _to meet you, Katsuki."

"Sure thing. Look, can we skip the nonsense?" Bakugo pulled his hands out of his pockets, explosions crackling to life between his fingertips as a smirk curled his lips. "I've seen those robes before. I know it's a mark of your villain club. But if you think I'm too scared to fight in public," his smirk blossomed into a full-blown smile, "you're gonna die."

"Now now, calm down. I did not come here for such confrontation! I simply wanted to meet an aspiring artist such as myself, un. Truly, your work is among the finest I have ever seen." Cyclops made several brushstrokes against the canvas; Bakugo could faintly tell that it was a painting of UA. This was all too strange, and Bakugo's smile faltered. Why the hell was the guy calling him an artist? "My name is Deidara. It's good to meet you, yeah." His smile reeked of arrogance, pissing Bakugo off even further.

"The hell does art have to do with anything?" Bakugo growled. "I know nobody would wear those robes of yours willingly, so I know you're with Masked Man. Don't screw with me!"

"Tobi mentioned meeting you. He said you were quite impressive, yeah. I told him that was no surprise to me. Oh, how I remember seeing you in that Sports Festival." Cyclops -Deidara- looked toward the sky, apparently reminiscing. "So much power, yet so graceful. I couldn't take my eyes off the screen. I just knew then that, finally, there was someone in the world who shares in my passion. I hadn't felt that way in so long; it was a truly _special _feeling, un."

A singular thought raced through Bakugo's mind.

What. The. Fuck. Could he not go even a single day without being harrassed by some stupid blond! Pikachu, Ramen Idiot, and now this guy?

"You got some screws loose, psycho?"

"Oh sure, you could say that. But considering you're the one who yelled at his classmates to die during a festival, I don't think you have that much room to talk, yeah."

Bakugo's hands opened wide, preparing to launch into combat immediately. There were a few students, all of them just nobody extras, watching now but he didn't care about them. The only thing they needed to do was get the hell away, because whatever Cyclops was capable of, he had the feeling from that smug confidence none of them could handle it.

"But don't let us be enemies, Bakugo. We could work together, the two of us. I shall be your Perugino and you my Raphael. Truthfully, I don't even care about this silly little Akatsuki gig. I shall play along for some time, but everyone knows a forced commission does not bring out an artist's most heartfelt passions, yeah?"

"WHY do you KEEP talking about ART!"

"Because, my young protege, explosions are beautiful. They contain all the majesty of an instant in time, never to be perfectly recreated again. They destroy the past to make room for the future. For that brief moment, there exists perfection. Don't you see?" Cyclops made one final, dramatic stroke, before putting the brush away into some hidden pocket. The villain slowly brought his hands back out, arms extended toward Bakugo, who watched them curiously, ready to move in any direction at even the slightest hint in danger.

"The... hell?" The guys palms had mouths... and they were chewing on something. He'd expected some kind of freakshow but this was a bit much. Bakugo stayed on guard. A useless quirk would not inspire such confidence in someone; especially not someone who was about to face his wrath and had seen his performance in the Sports Festival.

"Some artists like to be anonymous. I'm not one of them. I'm proud of my work. That's why I'm not afraid of being on camera. Always an honor to see the media appreciate my art, yeah." The palms started to spit out some kind of substance, to Bakugo's surprise and disgust. Even from several feet away, he saw it was some kind of clay, but could only watch as Deidara smiled with malicious calm and applied it to the canvas.

"You know," the freakshow continued, "you have no idea what's really happening, do you? Hokage probably didn't tell you a thing. You've landed right in the middle of a war where information is everything. And in a war of information, the ignorant die first, un."

"The hell are you talking about?"

"There was an understood agreement. Hokage broke it. Ask him about it, yeah?"

Bakugo scowled, which only seemed to increase Deidara's smile.

"I'm glad I came here. It reminds me a lot of my old school. I think that's part of the reason I wanted to meet you here. Such incredible inspiration for my art. Because art... is an explosion!"

And that's when it clicked. Bakugo knew he had little time left.

"RUN OR DIE!" He raised his hand in the air, letting loose as large an explosion as he could muster. Stupid wannabes wouldn't do anything consciously; he had to make sure they reacted out of instinct. He could see the extras scattering, fear written on their faces. He then flung his hand in front of him as a laugh boomed from nearby. His eyes darted to the sound and saw Cyclops looking directly at him, a huge smile on his face.

"I look forward to our next meeting."

Somehow, even among all the screaming, time seemed to freeze and Bakugo heard every word in slow motion. The guy made some kind of hand symbol, and on instinct, Bakugo used a small explosion to launch himself backwards. In the next instant, the canvas exploded in a bright, loud blast, filling the air with smoke and dust and splintering shards of cement and debris. He threw his hands in front of his face to guard himself mid-air and frantically scanned the chaos for Cyclops's location.

But the moment Bakugo landed back on the ground, a vortex of swirls formed in the air and Masked Man appeared, grabbing onto Cyclops... and the guy was waving at him.

Bakugo's skin crawled; if these people thought they were just going to mess around and treat him like some insignificant kid, oh boy he was going to show them. He was long past due for a bit of real explodo-killing. But before he could head in that direction, the two villains disappeared into the swirl before it winked out of existence, leaving only the smashed remains of sidewalk and the raining remnants of dust and smoke. He grit his teeth in frustration.

Nothing else to do, he adjusted his tie and began walking toward class. He ignored the confused staring of the extras as he did so. He hadn't been expecting a guy to use mouths in his palms to spit out explosive clay.

He would be ready next time. Count on it.

* * *

Despite the terrorist attack, the school day at UA was mostly the same as any other day. Bakugo was questioned about it, which was not a surprise considering the explosive nature of the attack, but the cameras had gotten a pretty clear picture. Principal said his quirk usage was acceptable, unlike a group of classmates who had gone too far in Hosu trying to fight the Hero-Killer. That caught his attention a bit, but it shouldn't have, because nothing stupid his idiot classmates do should surprise him anymore.

He didn't care about the school's press release- 'We will continue as normal but will be sure to investigate all strange behavior around our campus' - or any of that unimportant nonsense. As far as he was concerned, this incident was over. Oh sure, the extras talked about it a lot, but for the most part his classmates ignored it in favor of talking about their internships. Except for Aizawa's absolutely scalding lecture about quirk usage law.

As he was walking out of school, Spiky-Hair was, as always, right by his side and giving him a headache.

"It was so weird choosing the same internship as Tetsutetsu; well, maybe not really, he does seem like a pretty manly dude, so I guess it's a little understandable. And maybe it was a little fun having someone to intern with but overall I'd say it was a boring. I learned a lot though."

That almost made Bakugo laugh. "Doubt it." He knew first-hand that Spiky-Hair was not exactly a quick learner. It made his skin crawl even worse than usual to imagine having to try to tutor two of them. Must've interned with The Patient Hero or something.

"Always so rude. Anyway, what was your internship with Hokage like? Was he super cool and manly?"

"Mind your own business." Barely had the words left his mouth when a horrible noise reached his ear.

"BAKKUN!"

For a split second, Bakugo froze. He noticed the immediate surprise on Spiky-Hair's face and resumed walking. He should have known better than to think someone as annoying as that idiot blond would go away so easily, but why the hell did he have to get harassed at school? And why, exactly, on the first day after he had left 'Konoha'. He could see the moron, standing outside the gate, waving with that huge, goofy, asking-to-be-exploded grin. Already Bakugo's blood was boiling but continued to walk at a normal pace, until they inevitably reached the gate.

"What are you doing here, moron!"

Spiky-Hair turned to him. "Wait, Bakubro? You actually know this guy?"

Blond Moron responded. "Of course I know Bakkun. We've been hanging out for the past week!"

Bakugo ignored him, already sick as hell from the people surrounding him. "NERD!" He shouted loudly at Deku, who was muttering as he walked near them. It pissed Bakugo off. How the hell such a meek, pathetic little loser ever got such a powerful... no, he wasn't going to worry about that right now. He needed to get through this without grinding his teeth to a fine powder.

"... never calls for me so something bad's probably happening and he sounds really angry but I hope it's not about me. I mean, sure, I'm stronger, but..."

"Get a hold of yourself, Deku!" Those green eyes snapped up at him, showing the slightest hint of fear. Bakugo wasn't really used to seeing that anymore. He must have sounded even more pissed off than he felt. Which was an achievement, for damn sure.

"Yes, K-Kacchan?"

"Awww, he calls you Kacchan? That's adorable Bakkun!"

Bakugo pointed one finger at Naruto, scowl on his face. "Deku, did you know about this?" The nerd looked at him, confused.

So not even Deku knew about Hokage having a sidekick? Of course not, why the hell would Deku know? Some guy who stayed in the background doing random odd jobs wasn't going to get media coverage. But if Deku didn't know, then that meant he could at least be sure the guy had no public profile that was hero related. Or, at least, not one connected to Hokage. The guy could still have a separate hero identity; Bakugo knew, at a minimum, that Naruto was physically strong and used chakra so it was possible. But then why always hang around Hokage?

"About what?" Deku asked. "About him? Do I... know him from somewhere?"

"Nah, but I saw you in the Sports Festival. You're an animal, Midoriya! Unusual to see somebody try to kill themselves in a tournament. My name's Naruto Uzumaki!"

Bakugo scowled. A last name? That was new.

Deku introduced himself. "Izuku Midoriya."

Followed by Spiky-Hair. "Eijiro Kirishima."

Okay, that was enough. "Can the intros!" Bakugo put his face into the palm of his hand. Honestly, how did it ever get to this point? He only wanted to graduate top of his class and be the Number One Hero; how the hell did he keep getting surrounded by losers?

"So, uh," Deku said, pathetically, looking between Bakugo and Naruto, "how do you know Kacchan?"

"We've been hanging out the past week."

Nerd's eyes lit up; Bakugo could practically see the sparkles in them. "While he was interning with Hokage?"

"Yeah!"

"So you know Hokage? You must right? Wow, that's so cool. Do you know more about his quirk? Can you tell me anything? I know a bunch of people online like to theorize about it and guess what it could do but there's not enough video... oh, how many people have been Hokage? Did the past ones die or retire?"

Deku activated Mutter Mode. "I've heard it said that each Hokage has a few signature abilities but looking at the videos uploaded it gets hard to distinguish between them. Like, it's clear they don't use these signature abilities all the time and that makes it harder. But does every Hokage have the same quirk? Is that even possible? I mean, after all, there are a few baseline abilities like moving on water that seem to be shared but..."

The look of disbelief Naruto wore while being bombarded by questions and muttering had a strangely calming effect on Bakugo. He actually smirked at the sight of someone else being annoyed by shitty Deku and his ceaseless annoyances.

After a few seconds, Naruto smiled. "Wow Midoriya, that's an incredibly invasive line of questioning!" The shocked look on Deku's face almost made Bakugo laugh. He even might have, if it weren't for the deceptively serious undertone in Naruto's voice. No one else would notice it; they were all gullible as hell. "Sheesh, just kidding! Calm down man. I know Hokage, I know everything about his quirk, but I'm not saying anything or he'd be pretty mad. It'd be dangerous for me to say how many people have been Hokage, but some die and some retire. I really couldn't hear whatever all that muttering was about, sorry."

Well one of those answers was intriguing. Some Hokage had died and some had retired. That meant there were a few ex-Hokage wandering around out there. Even if they weren't doing hero work anymore, they probably kept in touch with the present Hokage.

Spiky-Hair had a smile on his face. "Well, it's pretty cool that you know Bakubro. He's a little bit prickly sometimes..." Bakugo growled as Kirishima's arm wrapped around his shoulder. If Spiky-Hair thought that a hardness quirk was going to save his sorry hide, then Bakugo was more than willing to give a Sports Festival rematch. Not that it'd be too much of a fight. "But he's caring, in his own way. When everyone else doubted Uraraka, Bakubro here gave his all against her. At first I thought doing it was unmanly but I realized, when I heard everyone start to talk about all of Uraraka's strengths, that it was the manliest thing of all!"

"I did it so I could fucking win the tournament, you red-headed jackass." Not his fault if literally everyone else underestimated her. They needed to start paying some damn attention.

"And what about earlier, when you used an explosion to warn everyone away from that crazy villain?"

"The fuck do you think is going to happen if students die and I was just casually talking to the killer? Forget being expelled, the prison would throw away the damn key." And then he'd never be the Number One Hero, which was absolutely not even in the equation.

"Kacchan." The Nerd had his head down looking all kinds of pathetic before looking up straight at Bakugo, confidence in his eyes. "If you had really wanted to, you could have ended the Uraraka fight quicker. Sure, she's strong, but her quirk is a bad match-up for yours."

"I wanted to have a little fun." Honestly, why the hell did it even matter to anyone else? It was a fight, and he was free to go about it whatever damn way he wanted without having to subject himself to the analysis of idiots.

"You don't fight for fun. You might have fun while fighting, but you only fight to win, Kacchan."

What the hell gave that nerd the right to act like he knew everything! Whenever Deku got all preachy, acting like they had some special connection because they hung out when they were practically toddlers, Bakugo's blood turned to lava.

Naruto spoke up. "Bakkun's not the type to admit he cares about his classmates, huh? That's not a surprise. He still acts like we're not even friends!"

"WHY ARE YOU HERE!" He looked toward the idiot, glaring, wanting an answer. Miraculously, Deku went to leave and talk to somebody else. Maybe Four-Eyes, Bakugo didn't give a shit as long as the nerd was gone. How was it that every interaction with that little pathetic Deku left him feeling so damn angry? Not that Naruto was usually any better.

"I saw the news report about the attack earlier and wanted to make sure you were okay!"

News report would have absolutely said zero students injured; probably no video. Possibly at most a photo of the villain responsible. Bullshit.

"That's so manly!" Spiky-Hair was, as usual, incapable of letting him think. Bakugo wondered how simple a life it was that Spiky-Hair lived with zero time devoted to things like 'thought'. "Nothing like checking up on a bro whenever they need you. I bet you had to come a long way too! Boy, Bakugo must have really been on good behavior if you like him at all after just one week."

Enough of this nonsense. He looked straight into Naruto's blue eyes, and it was clear to him that there was something more important to talk about.

"Kirishima, leave." There was a look of surprise on Spiky-Hair's face, but Bakugo didn't care.

"Oh, umm, okay. Yeah, no problem. Good to meet you, Narubro!"

"Right back at you, Eijibro!" The two fist-bumped, and mimicked an explosion before Spiky-Hair started walking away. After such a display of stupidity, Bakugo would have been happy to supply them with the real deal. He resumed walking, casually glancing to make sure nobody else was around as Naruto quickly joined him.

Bakugo did not waste anytime. The quicker he dealt with whatever Naruto wanted to talk about, the quicker the idiot would be gone. "So why are you actually here, moron?"

Naruto responded immediately. "I saw the news report; I know it had something to do with you, but I can't think of any reason why Deidara would show up here."

Somewhat serious Naruto was something Bakugo could deal with. Much less of a headache than default head-full-of-bricks Naruto.

"Typical villain shit. Asked me to join him, told him I'd kill him."

"Huh? Recruitment?" The surprise was obvious on Naruto's face. "That's... unusual. It doesn't fit at all. Why would Akatsuki try to recruit you?"

"I don't think it was for that damn villain group. He said he'd ditch them eventually. And talked way too damn much about art."

Naruto scratched his head, clearly confused but thinking. "Okay, so, it was personal then. Leader probably didn't know. How did he get away, anyway? Tobi?"

"Yeah." Bakugo remembered another part of that conversation. "Also mentioned something about Hokage breaking a deal. That's all."

"Oh yeah?" Naruto started chuckling lightly. "This might surprise you, Bakkun, but you can't trust a group of villains!" The guy's tone was loud and light-hearted, a little odd for the subject in Bakugo's opinion. "I don't know what their final plans are, but safe to say that agreement is done for and they broke it first. Doubt they'd want to settle that in court."

"What the hell is it!" Seriously, he didn't care about any agreement but it felt like Naruto was going out of his way to not say it or something and it was getting on Bakugo's nerves.

"Sheesh, easy there Bakkun! Villains who know about chakra don't want Hokage teaching about it to others, and Hokage doesn't want civilians caught up in any of it. Hokage would only teach chakra to those capable of using it, and in return, those villains would not cause too much of a mess. It's an understanding that's existed between us, keeping the public uninvolved. Obviously it wasn't the greatest arrangement, but it kept some form of order."

"How do any villains know about this in the first place?"

Naruto didn't immediately answer and Bakugo narrowed his eyes. "It's just something that's gotten around over all the years. Don't know how it started. I don't really care, either. I think it's stupid."

Bullshit, Bakugo thought. "Alright, let me get this shit straight. Basically, I was trained as a message! A sign that the deal was off. That sound about right?" Bakugo felt a bit of anger building up at the idea of being used, but it receded a little as Naruto shook his head.

"Don't be stupid. If that was all it could have been any random kid without chakra."

"Whatever." It annoyed him that he actually wanted an answer. He shouldn't care about any of this stupid shit, but Bakugo couldn't help it. Hokage sent one internship offer in the history of UA, and it was for him. There had to be some kind of reason.

There was, again, that serious look on Naruto's face that always seemed to catch him off guard. Bakugo hadn't seen it since that day he defeated the ten-percent clone, a look of pure seriousness that made the idiot seem to fade away.

"Alright, Bakkun, let me put it like this. Based on the Sports Festival performance, I imagined you'd stall out at a twenty-percent Hokage clone and then defeat it around the last day. Instead, you skipped over twenty-percent after that rematch against the ten-percent. I thought you'd be the only one from your year who could even reach thirty-percent, honestly. And somehow, you went past even that."

To Bakugo's ears, the words were spoken so confidently and sincerely that they had to be true, at least in Naruto's mind. Bakugo did not nod, or give any indication that he was affected by the words, but he figured that since he got stronger out of it then it didn't really matter too much if Hokage had some other motive to offer him an internship. Although, his fists clenched out of reflex when he thought of those three hellacious fights against thirty-percent.

Naruto continued talking, the seriousness fading back into Naruto's usual upbeat tone. "But honestly, I don't think any of that matters. You know, you can spend all day coming up with reasoning that can go in any direction. That's not Hokage's style. When it comes to people, he trusts his instincts. He has a good feeling about you, trust me. It's because you remind him of himself."

Bakugo paused suddenly, confused. What the hell was that supposed to mean? He thought back to all his interactions with Hokage and that just didn't really seem to fit. That must mean there was even more he was missing. And here he was, thinking he was solving all this stupid shit!

"And by the way," Naruto continued, "just let me know if you want to train some more with Hokage. Just because that little week's over doesn't mean you can't keep it up."

Bakugo spoke before he even thought about the words. "Let me guess, you'll be here tomorrow too, won't you?" He knew his words had no venom, and if Naruto's smile was any indication, the idiot knew it too. Bakugo may not want to see that damn idiot ever again, but he could endure one more day of hell if it got results. No one would ever say he didn't have a damn high pain tolerance. He was going to solve this shit once and for all tomorrow, and then he'd never think about it again.

Naruto smiled. "Well, if that means you want to hang out, then sure thing Bakkun!"

They had reached the station at this point; Bakugo was more than ready to get away. "Fuck off."

After taking his seat, Bakugo clenched his fists and stared a hole into the back of the seat in front of him. He sat like that for several minutes, fighting every single aspect of his entire existence as he contemplated the idea in his mind. If it were just him and Naruto, then he probably wouldn't get much new information. Based on what he'd seen today, Naruto could get a little careless around others. In fact, there was one person in particular that seemed to draw out information.

He grit his teeth, reaching into his pockets and grabbing his phone, almost wishing he'd blow the fucker up on accident. Except he was Bakugo Katsuki and he didn't do stupid shit like that. Bakugo found his desired contact and started a new message. Because this was damn sure the first text he'd send and hopefully the last.

'_Deku. After school tomorrow. Naruto. Not going to fight unless you can't stop your damn muttering.'_

His frown deepened, before he decided to send one more message. This one would be the last.

'_Fuck you.'_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> beta read by: the road I know (FFN)
> 
> So sorry for taking so long to post this chapter over here on AO3; I promise from now on that all chapters will be posted on AO3 and FFN simultaneously. I've been a bit less active as a writer recently than I would like but I'm trying to devote more meaningful time to it. 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed the chapter; I think things are shaping up pretty nicely in this story up to this point. Naruto's brief interaction with a few other 1-A students was honestly super fun to write. 
> 
> Thanks for reading! Feel free to leave a comment/kudos/bookmark, or don't, I still appreciate you reading this much!


	7. Investigation: Trip to the Arcade!

Bakugo could feel tons of eyes on him. His scowl intensified. Why could he not even enjoy a simple lunch without everyone annoying him? Was that really too much of a problem for these no good extras?

"Hey, ummm, Bakubro? Are you feeling alright? You kinda look like, well, you know... kinda like you're planning the downfall of all society."

What the hell did that even mean? He was in a perfectly good mood, all things considered.

"He's been grumpy all day, so let's not blame our visitor explicitly for Blasty's bad mood, okay guys?" Pinkie was talking like he wasn't even there; it pissed him off. A lot.

"I, uh, think I'm gonna sit somewhere else today?" Pikachu quickly left the table, and Bakugo could breathe a sigh of relief that much had happened. Before much longer, it was just himself, Pinkie, Spiky-Hair, and...

"Kacchan, ummm, I was wanting to talk to you about that text you sent me?" Deku's voice sounded as weak and pathetic as ever.

Great, he could barely manage to endure a normal day surrounded by typical idiots, and now Deku was here. Just looking at the freckled loser sitting across from him made his right arm want to throw a hook. Thinking on it, he supposed he had set himself up for a day of Hell on Earth by planning to have Naruto and Deku around him after school. It would have been nice for the annoyances to wait until after school, but he should have known he was never so damn lucky.

"Thought I was pretty clear." Bakugo said between gritted teeth. "After. School."

Deku pulled out his phone, at least looking a little bit serious. "Well, I wouldn't call it clear. Just some sentence fragments and some... unnecessary language. I think I understood what you were asking, though. I mean..."

"MUTTER AND DIE!" What had he let his life become that he knew ahead of time whenever that damn nerd was about to start muttering.

"Wait," Spiky-Hair said, obviously confused, "Bakubro, what I'm hearing is that you texted Midoriya? That's a little weird for you, something going on?"

Shit, now Kirishima was involved. Talk about something he didn't need. Hard-head was definitely not going to be even slightly helpful and listening to all that bro talk between him and Naruto was not happening. Pinkie was looking at him curiously as well. As if there was any reality where he needed that duo of idiots looking out for him. This was not an annoyance he wanted to add on to what was already sure to be a shitty day.

"If you leave me alone, I might tell you about it later. Now get the hell away from me, both of you," he said toward Pinkie and Spiky-Hair.

Spiky-Hair gave him a reluctant look but Bakugo returned it with a scowl. After another moment, the guy actually left, Pinkie following him with a roll of her eyes. They were definitely going to pester the hell out of him later, but at least later wasn't right now.

"You know Kacchan, they're really good friends. Maybe..."

"Deku, if you think for a second that I care about listening to your damn advice on friendship, then holy shit you're even dumber than I thought."

Deku flinched backwards slightly; Bakugo's scowl deepened. "R-right, of course. A-anyway, what exactly did you want me to do anyway? I don't think I really understand just from your text."

Bakugo's eyes rolled automatically. "Don't waste my time, Deku. Just tell me whatever you found out so this torture ends."

Deku had the gall to look bewildered. "What do you mean whatever I found out? I didn't know I was supposed to be investigating him for you or anything. You could have just told me that Kacchan, you don't need to be so... so... vague."

Not exactly feeling up to getting life advice from a lifelong loser, Bakugo clenched his fists as he sat up straighter in his chair. "Listen here, Deku. I wasn't asking for your damn advice. Naruto is associated with Hokage, and Hokage is a major hero with a mysterious side. I know for a fact that you searched his name as soon as you went home yesterday and probably checked a bunch of old articles for mentions of a sidekick. You're still a damn fanboy. So even if everything was fucking useless, you're better off telling me whatever the hell you found out than trying to lecture me, got it?"

The Nerd had the decency to nod and start looking at his phone. Bakugo simply sat there in silence until Deku spoke. "I was pretty sure that I never heard anything about Hokage having a sidekick so I didn't really bother with that. He introduced himself as Naruto Uzumaki, so obviously it was pretty simple to start by searching that. If, uh, you actually care, I'm not sure why you didn't look it up earlier?"

"He only ever mentioned a last name yesterday, talking to you. Moving on."

"Right. So, at first I figured I might not get any results when I searched him online. Naruto could have been an alias or something, it's not really a normal name huh? But the first result was pretty simple. You remember the Chunin Tournament, right Kaachan?"

"Vaguely."

"Huh? How can you say that! We used to always say we were going to enter..."

"What does any of this have to do with anything, Deku!" Seriously, damn Nerd needed to find a point and stick to it.

"I... was getting to that." And now why did the green-eyed loser sound so damn dejected? Stupid Deku wouldn't have even been allowed to enter the Chunin Tournament without revealing that quirk of his anyway. "You remember how the Chunin Tournament was a quirks-allowed sparring exhibition for kids ten to sixteen, right?"

Deku talked to him like he was still four years old. It couldn't piss him off more. "Spare me the history lesson."

"But you said..."

"Just get to some kind of point Nerd!"

"Someone posted a video of his last fight in the Tournament; it was actually the last complete fight in Chunin history, though, since the next competitor severely injured a lot of spectators and even a few heroes."

"Shitshow tournament was dying anyway." Participation had been going down, larger networks stopped covering it due to ten year olds getting curb stomped. The national spotlight was dead; he hadn't even been planning to enter it anymore by the time it was finally canceled.

Deku just looked at him in a confused way before standing up briefly and walking around the table to take a seat beside him. Despite Bakugo's growling and definite size advantage, Deku did not appear particularly intimidated. Even so, he obviously knew better than to say anything and simply held out the phone as the video began playing. Bakugo looked at the title; _'Naruto Uzumaki vs. Neji Hyuuga, Chunin Tournament Final Bracket Round 1 Fight 3.'_

Apparently the short pipsqueak in a crazy orange and blue jacket with green goggles was Naruto. Pretty much immediately, it was obvious that his opponent was a better fighter. As in, before the fight had even started because they seemed to be talking. Other guy had a crisp fighting stance, while that blond moron just stood around. After a few moments, the fight finally started. Naruto clumsily charged in, trying a few punches before immediately getting his ass kicked by a few finger touches that must have been related to the other guy's quirk.

Bakugo started to think he really had completely wasted his time and that the moron was completely worthless after all, those brief moments of seeming competence merely some sort of illusion. It was apparent that the other fighter was simply very good in close quarters and Naruto didn't have any long range attacks in his arsenal. That fact, combined with Naruto's total lack of actual technique, made the conclusion seem obvious. But then, with a very familiar trick, Naruto suddenly gained a numbers advantage over his opponent.

The fight turned out to not be so boring after all. Even though his opponent was a superior fighter, somehow, Naruto kept going with just enough intensity to make it seem like he had a chance. Pulling out trick after trick, doing anything in his power to pull out a victory even against those odds. However, eventually, that damn idiot finally took one too many hits and was down for the count, lying in the dirt that made up the large outdoor arena. For whatever reason, Bakugo could not help but feel the slightest bit disappointed.

"Wow, what an amazing fight, huh Kacchan? I think I figured it out - that Neji guy has a quirk that allows him to completely shut off nerve points with just a touch from his fingers. Naruto, though, I don't know what his could be..."

"Deku, shut the..." Bakugo was interrupted by a loud stir from the crowd in the video. They both looked back down, just in time to see the Naruto that had been lying down in obvious defeat disappear in smoke as the real deal jumped out of the ground and delivered a vicious uppercut. The surprise of the attack was enough to knock his opponent unconscious and, just like that, that blond moron had somehow defeated an opponent that was clearly superior.

* * *

"Oh, look at that! Kamui Woods and Mount Lady are at it again! It's amazing how much they've moved up the rankings, and in such a short time too! It seems like just yesterday that Mount Lady made her debut and she's already done so much more than a lot of heroes ever do."

This whole thing was already getting on his nerves, and they had only just gotten to Musutafu. His plan had been that Deku would ask Naruto a bunch of questions and that Naruto would let out more information, but so far, whatever nonsensical bullshit the two had talked about had been completely pointless drivel. And now that moronic Deku was distracted by a wall of TV screens at the front of a store.

"You really know a lot about heroes, don't you Midoriya?"

Nothing Deku said was especially informative; he himself didn't give a shit about Mount Lady and could have probably said similar gibberish if he wanted.

"Damn Nerd's been a hero fanboy his entire life."

Deku had the decency to look embarrassed. "I just spent a lot of time studying heroes since I always wanted to be one. Guess it's not really a switch I can turn off; it's just so amazing how much they risk themselves to save others, ya know?"

Bakugo's eyes rolled instinctively at the typical repetitive hero talk coming from Deku.

Naruto chuckled. "Man, studying? What kind of future hero wants to study other heroes. You should've been out practicing. I know it must have caused some damage with that quirk of yours, but after that Sports Festival performance I think a little more training would have done wonders for you!"

Bakugo clearly remembered saying that Deku hadn't used a quirk until high school back in Konoha. And judging by Naruto's reaction at that time, it hardly seemed like something that would be quickly forgotten, even by him.

"Well, ummm, yeah, it was dangerous, ya know? Hey Kacchan, where are we heading anyway?"

He hadn't thought much about it but he knew the direction that his feet were carrying him. One of the places that helped him survive all those annoying parasites from middle-school. Or at least helped them survive him.

"Arcade."

"Oh okay, that's right down the street!" Deku said, uselessly.

"An... arcade? Huh, ya know, I've never actually been to one of those. I'm in!"

Arcades were the only decent form of entertainment to be found in the hell-hole known as Musutafu. Everywhere else was a haven for the insignificant losers of the world to try to feel better about themselves. Nobody goes to an arcade to try to lose themselves in a different world or any of that shit. There were only two purposes: destroying the opponent's scores or defeating them head-to-head in a game of skill.

Deku looked confused. "Really? Never? Where did you and your friends like to go then?"

"Oh, actually, well I wasn't really all that popular as a kid. And it's not like orphans are..." Naruto paused then, eyes widening slightly. It lasted only a split second, just long enough for Bakugo to take notice. He was sure Deku noticed too. Of course, Deku would think the pause was due to Naruto not wanting to talk about being an orphan. The reality was that Naruto had slipped again. The only problem was that he couldn't think of any particular reason that the blond being an orphan should be important.

Moron continued. "Well, they're not exactly known for having a bunch of money, ya know?"

"Oh geez, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to bring anything like that up!" Deku quickly apologized, though it was met only by Naruto laughing loudly and shrugging it off.

It wasn't long after that they entered the Mohoshi Family Arcade. Most arcades were dumps where the kids would make a mess of everything they could get their grimy hands on. Old Man Mohoshi, on the other hand, was a tough old bastard that would run out any kid that dared to leave their gum anywhere but the trash and kept the place clean.

Bakugo glanced over at Naruto, who was wearing a look of genuine awe at the sight of all the games. Looks like the blond hadn't been lying after all. Why the hell anyone would lie about going to an arcade, he didn't know, but at this point he wouldn't put it past the guy.

They exchanged a few thousand yen a piece for some coins, and Bakugo immediately knew the best game to play. Was it the best because it would help him figure out what the hell was up with Naruto quicker than any other game? Hell no; it was the best because _All-Might's Super Smashdown Revisited _was obviously superior to every other machine in the place, and he'd absolutely be willing to fight anyone on that subject. It was an old game that had been in the arcade for as long as he'd been alive, but it damn sure had better fighting mechanics than any of the newer ones. Plus, All-Might wasn't made a total weakling just to match up with all the other heroes like he always was in newer fighting games.

"Which of you losers dies first?" It had been a while since he had been to the arcade but he knew he was still more than capable of wiping the floor with either of them.

"Midoriya gets to be your first victim, Bakkun. I'll get a look at how things work so I can take you down after!"

"M-me? Well, it's actually been a while since I've been to an arcade. I've been so busy with school and..."

"You think I haven't been, Deku?!" Seriously, as if he was spending his time making random arcade visits instead of focusing on his own work or training. How the hell did that nerd always manage to make him so angry?

"Oh, no, that's not what I meant Kacchan! Really!"

He rolled his eyes, before glancing back over his shoulder and realizing that Naruto had already vanished. Somewhat curious, he looked around and saw the blond staring down a row of crane machines. So much for learning the game... seriously, how could that guy be so easily distracted?

"Whatever Deku." He placed his coins in the machine, bringing up the character select screen as Deku did the same.

"So, this Naruto guy is really interesting isn't he? He must be, if you want to know more about him."

"Nothing but a damn pest." The two of them selected All-Might, meaning the fight was going to be a mirror match.

"I think he's hiding something but you probably have a better idea about that than me."

"Not a high bar to clear, clueless Nerd."

"If I'm so clueless, why'd you invite me?"

"Deku, the entire fucking reason you're here is that he forgets to stay in-character because you are so damn clueless! Don't get the wrong idea just because being naive as all hell happened to be useful for once."

The match began, and there was a blissful silence. It had been a long time since he played and that damn Deku surprisingly went on the offensive, basically just button-mashing like a total idiot at the beginning of the fight and causing him to lose a ton of health. Even when he finally got used to the game again, his health was already low and Deku was also remembering how to do a few of the harder to block combos. Taking the offensive, he managed to make things close before Deku landed a Delaware Smash which definitely only hit because of a bug where All-Might's hit box expanded two pixels during certain animations.

The fights were a best-of-3 series. Bakugo stood up straight with a scowl on his face; there was absolutely no way he was about to lose to Deku again. Hell, it wasn't even fair to call that a loss! It was just luck! This time, as the fight started, he was already at his absolute best. Deku didn't get nearly as many lucky hits this time and, even if that damn Nerd knew how to exploit the openings in certain combo sequences, he managed to win with over half his health. Looking over, he could see Deku completely focused. It made his scowl deepen even further.

The third fight was an all-out battle. While there were a lot of smaller hits, both of them were doing everything they could to avoid getting hit by the heavy combos which did a lot more damage than standard attacks. By the end, both of their faces were inches away from the screen. With both their health low, it made sense to play it safe. Instead of being a total coward, Bakugo decided to go for a final Delaware Smash. He couldn't believe it when Deku did the same thing at the same time and could only watch as the two All-Mights went down.

"Draw!" The machine said, clearly with a death-wish. Such bullshit! If Deku hadn't gotten so damn lucky in that first fight then it wouldn't have ever come down to that! And that meant the series as a whole was a draw, which was stupid as hell since there should obviously be some kind of sudden death round but the developers apparently had one brain cell split between the whole group and never thought of it.

"Wow, that was fun Kacchan!" Bakugo turned toward the green-haired brat, seething, about ready to end him once and for all.

"Sheesh Bakkun, I don't have any idea what all that was, but I'm ready to give it a go!"

Bakugo looked behind him, and in a moment his seething rage was overtaken by confusion. Naruto was there, smiling super brightly. "What the..."

"Umm... what's that, Naruto?" Deku was also confused. With good reason.

Naruto only smiled wider, before holding an extremely large stuffed frog above his head. "Behold! The great Toad Chief, Gamabunta!"

"Hah, what the hell is that thing! Seriously, who would ever want such a ridiculous frog!" Honestly, what a ridiculous sight! Then he looked over, and saw that damn Deku staring at him wide-eyed. "What the hell, Deku? Don't tell me you'd want that stupid frog too!"

Naruto shoved the nerd out of the way before he could answer. "He is not a frog, Bakkun! He is THE Toad Chief, and I'm gonna make sure you treat him with proper respect. Can you hold him for me Midoriya?"

"... Sure thing." Bakugo couldn't help but laugh as he saw that gigantic frog in the pipsqueak's arms, easily blocking out the Nerd's entire body from the eyes down to the waist. "How, umm, how did you get this? I know there's nothing like this in the crane machines..."

"Oh, after I won a few things from those, I hit the jackpot twice on one of those other games since I was still waiting on you two. And that's how I managed to get him from the top shelf at the prize store! Mohoshi-san said that it's been there for years, just waiting for a customer like me."

"Yeah, just waiting for an absolute idiot with no damn taste." Even though those people roamed the streets of this city in ridiculous abundance, apparently none of them had ever managed to afford such a ludicrous prize. The two of them put their coins in, taking them to the character select screen. Bakugo glanced over, seeing a look of bewilderment on Naruto's face.

"No Hokage?" Naruto asked.

Deku answered quickly. "No, he's not officially ranked and they didn't really want to make a moveset for him." What a fanboy.

Naruto just sighed. "Oh well. Guess I'll pick All-Might too then. Might as well make sure this is a fair match!"

"Oh, forget that," Bakugo said, with a devilish sneer, "this is definitely not gonna be a fair match. I'm gonna wipe the floor with you!"

The first fight went exactly how he expected it would. A complete and total beatdown as Naruto tried to learn the controls. It was now obvious that the moron had told the truth about never going to an arcade. Bakugo, of course, took no mercy on his opponent, more than willing to exploit Naruto's total lack of gaming experience. The only thing that surprised him, as he won the fight without taking any damage, was that at no point did Naruto ask him to take it easy. Glancing over, he saw the blond looking over the controls again with a very serious look on his face.

The second fight started out mostly the same, even if Naruto had already vastly improved in his control of the game. There was still a massive skill difference between the two of them, so Bakugo didn't really care that a few of his combos were being blocked and Naruto could land a few hits. In no time at all, Naruto was at the brink of defeat while Bakugo still had most of his health. That was when he suddenly got slammed into from the side, with enough force to make him take a step away from the machine. For a second, he didn't know how to react. And that second was all it took for Naruto to throw a celebratory fist in the air.

"Hah, I won a fight!"

"You damn cheater! What the hell was that!?" Seriously, the guy had bumped him while they were playing? And not just some light contact; that shit could have knocked someone out cold if they were in worse shape!

Naruto wore a challenging smirk. "Aww, I'm sorry if that hurt Bakkun!"

Getting back into position, Bakugo planted his feet firmly on the ground as the countdown started for the third fight of the series. A stupid surprise attack like that was definitely not going to work twice, he would make sure of that. And if that idiot thought it wasn't going to be repaid, then he was in for a reckoning.

The third fight started with Naruto immediately taking the offensive, only for Bakugo to block and take the momentum his way. This was met with another bump from Naruto, except this time, Bakugo was prepared for it and not rattled at all.

"You damn cheat!" He said, pushing back with force. The two of them evened out, shoulder to shoulder, swaying only slightly left or right as the sound of the game and rapid button pressing filled the air. Mixed in with a bit of growling from Bakugo. Next thing Bakugo knew, there was a hand in front of his eyes! Reacting quickly, he elbowed the offender roughly, causing Naruto to draw his arm back from the momentary wince, an action that only briefly surprised him. The guy had actually used his other hand to press the buttons while his elbow 'controlled' movement. There was only a slight reprieve before the physical shoving match resumed.

Both their health bars low, Bakugo managed to land one of All-Might's more powerful combos to draw the match to an end.

"HAHAHA, eat shit and die you loser!" Naruto's head hung low in shame from the defeat, while Bakugo felt good about overcoming all those silly tricks. There was no doubt that Naruto was a quick learner but, just like that Chunin fight he had seen earlier, the idiot thought that he would overcome their skill gap by being devious. No way Bakugo was going to let that happen.

"Kacchan... I haven't heard you laugh like this since we were kids..."

And his good mood was gone.

Fucking Deku. Bakugo had worked his entire life to become the Number One Hero, he had trained his quirk since he was four years old. What the hell gave Deku any right to tell him how to live! He was going to be the best, and he was damn serious about it, not like some useless little twerp who hadn't even bothered to work out a day in his life until high school. He didn't have time to waste if he was going to stay ahead; even this damn arcade trip was a part of his journey to the top.

All he could see of Deku were those ridiculous green eyes that wanted to lie and say 'I don't know what I just said, Kacchan, but I'm sorry!' As if he hadn't heard those things before. Bakugo's teeth grit together. Deku always treated him like someone that needed to be saved! Always! Why did everyone always try to act like he needed to change and be a damn moron all the time?

"Kacchan, I'm..."

"Just shut the hell up!" He could not possibly stand to hear any sort of apology; leave it to that Nerd to ruin one of the few places he hadn't hated in this forsaken city. He didn't bother saying anything else and just walked out of the building; it was clearly pointless and he didn't need Deku around anymore. Hadn't really needed him in the first place; just made everything slightly more convenient. Clearly not worth it.

Hands in his pockets, eyes focused forward with an angry snarl on his face, Bakugo was half a block away by the time he noticed footsteps beside him. He looked over to see an altogether too familiar idiot, holding on to a giant frog that was on his back with two legs over his shoulders like some kind of backpack.

"Ya know Bakkun, when I saw Midoriya here, I figured I would try to figure something out. Little strange trying to use an outing with a friend to do something like that, huh?"

"What more could you possibly want to know about that annoying Nerd? Just a fanboy who thinks he's better than everyone else, nothing more to it."

"You were grumbling, but you mentioned before, back in Konoha, that Midoriya was quirkless until high school. Doesn't that seem impossible to you, Bakkun?"

"Of course! That's why he hid his quirk the whole time, so everyone would treat him like he was quirkless and then he could lord it over our heads when he revealed his big secret. As if some actual quirkless loser would think he could get into UA!"

"I don't think you really believe that." Bakugo froze in his steps. What the hell was Naruto trying to say? "One of the things a prior Hokage wrote about was a villain with an extremely unique quirk. A quirk that made it possible to take someone's quirk, and give it to someone else."

A quirk really existed that could do something like that? Of course it made some sense; there were infinite varieties of quirks. But to think there was one that could just take a quirk away... and then even manage to give it to someone else... that was a ridiculous amount of power for someone to have. It was actually possible for a quirk from one person to be given to someone else?

"What happened to him?"

"Unfortunately, we don't really know. I thought that, maybe, it was possible that Midoriya had come into contact with that villain or a villain with a similar power. That'd help explain how he hadn't learned to use it without hurting himself at that Sports Festival; he didn't have time to, because it was new to him."

He almost laughed. He may have not been able to stand that damn Nerd with any fiber of his being, but the idea that Deku would be collaborating with villains was beyond insane. If All-Might so much as said 'Please, stop!' then Deku would give up every villain he'd ever met in the blink of an eye, alongside a notebook detailing each of their strengths and weaknesses, possibly alongside an illustration.

"If I know that damn Nerd there's no way he would ever work with a villain."

"Hokage and I knew nothing about him, besides the fact that he has a too familiar quirk amid some less-than-usual circumstances, and that he asked a lot of questions. Now sure, it seems pretty clear now that something else must be going on, but you can understand why Hokage would be worried about the possibility of a villain like that making a comeback."

"Whatever; it was a stupid idea. This whole day's been a waste, so now you should go back to Hokage and let him know you wasted your time."

"Oh, I wouldn't say it was wasted." Naruto's voice was somber, a strange thing to hear. "This is the first time I've just hung out and had fun with a friend in years." Then there was some kind of awkward laugh. "And, well, that prior friend kinda almost killed me. I'd appreciate it if you didn't do that, by the way."

"Guess you were wrong about your taste in friends."

Naruto only looked sadder; this was seriously starting to feel weird. "Things are going to get really bad if I was."

"I'm so sick of this mysterious bullshit! What is that supposed to mean!?"

Naruto finally perked up a bit, ending that whole sad charade he had going on. "Don't worry so much, Bakkun. If we're going to take down Akatsuki, then you'll get the full run-down eventually. But you still have a lot of school left; Finals will be here before you know it!"

Yeah, Finals were coming up soon. And he was going to make absolutely certain that he blew Deku and Half-and-Half out of the water. He remembered the offer from the day before that Hokage was still willing to train him.

"I'll train in Konoha on Saturdays," he said, gritting his teeth. He could do that much. "Better not be some convoluted route anymore." Someday, when he's the Number One Hero, all this hell he's endured will have been worth it.

Naruto smiled, ear-to-ear, making Bakugo regret his decision already. "Alright, you got it!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> beta read by: the road I know (FFN)
> 
> A/N: The longest chapter of the story so far; I'll try to make sure that it stays that way. I typically limit myself to 5k for everything outside A/N, but went just a tad over in order to write everything that I felt was necessary. I particularly hope everyone enjoyed the arcade scene as I've had that in my head since before I started actually writing the fic and had a ton of fun with it.
> 
> I also hope you enjoy the confirmation of several more Naruto characters, although I will state for clarity that, yes, this chapter means there will be no Summoning. I don't quite find it fitting within the MHA universe, and the workaround to make it fit is really not worth it relative to story impact.
> 
> Thank you all for reading. Please feel free to kudos, bookmark, and/or comment!


End file.
